Amphibians are a major clade of tetrapod vertebrates (class Amphibia) encompassing anurans (frogs and toads), caudates (salamanders and newts), and gymnophionans (caecilians). They are characterized by permeable, glandular skin that plays key roles in osmoregulation, gas exchange, and secretion of bioactive peptides, making them sensitive bioindicators of environmental change. Most species exhibit biphasic life histories with aquatic, gilled larvae and terrestrial, lung-breathing adults, though direct development and paedomorphosis also occur. Amphibians occupy pivotal positions in trophic networks and evolutionary biology, representing the earliest diverging extant lineage of tetrapods and providing critical models for studies of metamorphosis, regeneration, endocrine disruption, and emerging infectious diseases such as chytridiomycosis.
Seven new species of a distinctive frog-like insect have been discovered by a scientist from Anglia Ruskin University (ARU) in Cambridge, England.
Plants & Animals
Nov 13, 2025
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160
Frogs need water. Almost all of the world's 7,900 known frog species breed in fresh water. And when it rains, these amphibians erupt into a chorus of calls—croaks, trills, cheeps and bellows—to attract a mate.
Plants & Animals
Nov 13, 2025
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It is early evening in Australia's top end, and a hunter stalks its prey. Keenly alert, the northern quoll follows the sound of rustling in the leaf litter. It must be some kind of frog, the small carnivorous marsupial decides, ...
Ecology
Nov 11, 2025
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An international team of researchers has discovered three new, bizarre, and wart-covered species of tree toads from Tanzania that give birth to fully developed toadlets. A key element of the study was the examination of specimens ...
Plants & Animals
Nov 6, 2025
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The California tiger salamander relies on seasonal ponds to breed. But for decades, the species has been under pressure from non-native salamanders introduced in the 1950s and 1960s for use as fishing bait.
Plants & Animals
Nov 4, 2025
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Vertebrates have extremely different brain sizes: even with the same body size, brain size can vary a hundredfold. As a rule, mammals and birds have the largest brains in relation to their body size, followed by sharks and ...
Plants & Animals
Nov 3, 2025
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A new University of Kentucky study used environmental DNA (eDNA) to search 90 sites across 73 rivers for Eastern hellbenders—large, secretive salamanders nicknamed "snot otters" and "lasagna lizards" for their mucus secretions ...
Ecology
Oct 31, 2025
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The microscopic flatworm (Stenostomum brevipharyngium) is one of nature's weirder creatures. Chop off its head, and it'll grow one back. Cut it in half, and it'll become two separate healthy worms. And now scientists have ...
Tadpole species that lost their lungs through evolution never re-evolve them, even when environmental change would make it advantageous—bucking long-standing assumptions about how lost traits can reemerge, according to a ...
Evolution
Oct 27, 2025
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108
Even within a single species, animals don't all respond in the same way to environmental changes. A new study of reed frogs in East Africa reveals that understanding these differences could be key to protecting wildlife.
Evolution
Oct 23, 2025
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