News tagged with animal diversity

Scientists produce first stem cells from endangered species

Starting with normal skin cells, scientists from The Scripps Research Institute have produced the first stem cells from endangered species. Such cells could eventually make it possible to improve reproduction ...

Biology / Cell & Microbiology

created Sep 04, 2011 | popularity 5 / 5 (4) | comments 4 | with audio podcast

Unexpected crustacean diversity discovered in northern freshwater ecosystems

Freshwater ecosystems in northern regions are home to significantly more species of water fleas than traditionally thought, adding to evidence that regions with vanishing waters contain unique animal life.

Biology / Ecology

created Mar 02, 2012 | popularity 5 / 5 (2) | comments 0 | with audio podcast

A new model for understanding biodiversity

(PhysOrg.com) -- Animals like foxes and raccoons are highly adaptable. They move around and eat everything from insects to eggs. They and other "generalist feeders" like them may also be crucial to sustaining ...

Biology / Ecology

created Nov 21, 2011 | popularity 5 / 5 (3) | comments 0 | with audio podcast

Study: Triple threat paints grim future for frogs

Frogs, salamanders and other amphibians may eventually have no safe haven left on the globe because of a triple threat of worsening scourges, a new study predicts.

Biology / Plants & Animals

created Nov 16, 2011 | popularity not rated yet | comments 0

Study reveals for first time true diversity of life in soils across the globe, new species discovered

(PhysOrg.com) -- Microscopic animals that live in soils are as diverse in the tropical forests of Costa Rica as they are in the arid grasslands of Kenya or the tundra and boreal forests of Alaska and Sweden, ...

Biology / Ecology

created Oct 18, 2011 | popularity 5 / 5 (7) | comments 2 | with audio podcast

History's normal rate of species disappearance is accelerating, scientists say

Biologist E.O. Wilson once pondered whether many of our fellow living things were doomed once evolution gave rise to an intelligent, technological creature that also happened to be a rapacious carnivore, fiercely territorial ...

Biology / Plants & Animals

created Jul 31, 2011 | popularity 3.9 / 5 (16) | comments 11

Scientist cites enlarged skeletal muscles as reason birds exist

A developmental biologist at New York Medical College is proposing a new theory of the origin of birds, which traditionally has been thought to be driven by the evolution of flight. Instead, Stuart A. Newman, Ph.D., credits ...

Biology / Evolution

created Jun 22, 2011 | popularity 5 / 5 (3) | comments 3 | with audio podcast

Understanding human threats to the Earth's largest habitat -- the deep sea

(PhysOrg.com) -- When most people think about the deep sea, they picture broad expanses of muddy seafloor. However, the majority of deep-sea animals, and perhaps the majority of all animals on Earth, live ...

Space & Earth / Environment

created Jan 26, 2010 | popularity 4.1 / 5 (12) | comments 6 | with audio podcast

New research shows how mobile DNA survives -- and thrives -- in plants, animals

(PhysOrg.com) -- Bits of movable DNA called transposable elements or TEs fill up the genomes of plants and animals, but it has remained unclear how a genome can survive a rapid burst of hundreds, even thousands of new TE ...

Biology / Biotechnology

created Oct 21, 2009 | popularity not rated yet | comments 0

Europe's bison: prehistoric survivor with Achilles' heel

As if straight out of prehistory, dozens of bison emerge timidly from the dark trunks of a primeval forest, their imposing bulk masking their vulnerability.

Biology /

created Feb 26, 2009 | popularity 4.8 / 5 (4) | comments 2

DNA barcoding verified the discovery of a highly disconnected crane fly species

Northwestern Europe harbors one of the best known biotas, thanks to the long faunistic and floristic traditions practiced there. However, some animal groups are far better known than others. The diversity ...

Biology / Plants & Animals

created May 18, 2012 | popularity not rated yet | comments 0

Genetic safety in numbers, platypus study finds

(Phys.org) -- Platypuses on the Australian mainland and in Tasmania are fighting fit but those on small islands are at high risk of being wiped out from disease, according to a University of Sydney study.

Biology / Plants & Animals

created May 18, 2012 | popularity 5 / 5 (3) | comments 0

Hunting could hurt genetic diversity of sandhill cranes, research suggests

(PhysOrg.com) -- As Wisconsin lawmakers debate whether to establish a hunting season for sandhill cranes, they may want to consider more than just the sheer number of birds, suggests a University of Wisconsin-Madison ...

Biology / Ecology

created Feb 09, 2012 | popularity 5 / 5 (1) | comments 0

Not the black sheep of domestic animals

Mapping the ancestry of sheep over the past 11,000 years has revealed that our woolly friends are stars among domestic animals, boasting vast genetic diversity and substantial prospects for continued breeding to further boost ...

Biology / Plants & Animals

created Feb 07, 2012 | popularity 3 / 5 (1) | comments 0

Trees influence epiphyte and invertebrate communities

Studies in temperate regions have demonstrated that genetic differences between individual trees affect the ecological communities and ecosystem processes associated with them. Now scientists at Manchester ...

Biology / Ecology

created Jan 05, 2012 | popularity 5 / 5 (1) | comments 0