"Shark Week," which kicks off this week, has captivated audiences for decades with stories of these powerful ocean predators. But the secret behind their extraordinary swimming abilities lies far deeper than their impressive ...
Plants & Animals
3 hours ago
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The fossilized spines of saber-toothed cats in the La Brea Tar Pits reveal evidence of an unexpectedly high prevalence of rare spinal nerve tumors, suggesting that the species became inbred just before extinction. These tumors, ...
Evolution
15 hours ago
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For more than a century, scientists have sought to reconstruct human evolution using diverse lines of evidence, including fossils, genetic variation across populations and ancient DNA. Building on these approaches, researchers ...
Evolution
Jul 24, 2026
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Evolution is all about trade-offs. Traits that may be beneficial in one situation may backfire in another. Over millions of years, species can become specialized for one way of living rather than being equally good at everything. ...
Birds can inhabit various environments with different climates and temperatures, ranging from cold polar regions to scorching hot deserts. To survive and thrive in these very different environments, they need to effectively ...
Humans are not the only animals that communicate. Birds sing to attract mates, dolphins use signature whistles that identify individuals, and many primates produce complex vocalizations that help them coordinate their social ...
Evolution
Jul 24, 2026
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In mammals, males are usually stronger and more competitive than females. Males also show greater inequality in reproductive success—the number of offspring they produce—than females. In spotted hyenas, the opposite is true: ...
Evolution
Jul 23, 2026
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Snakes are everywhere in our legends and mythology. Yet for most of us, our blood runs cold whenever we encounter these strangely undulating, scaly tubes of muscle slithering through the leaf litter.
Evolution
Jul 23, 2026
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A new study reveals that human activities have fundamentally reshaped biodiversity patterns on islands across the globe, with important implications for how scientists understand ecology, evolution and conservation.
Evolution
Jul 23, 2026
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About 22,000 years ago, a giant brown bear lumbered across what is now Portugal. The creature weighed around 385 kg (about 850 pounds), making it one of the largest of its kind ever found, towering over the Iberian brown ...
