Migration in organisms refers to the directed, typically seasonal or life-stage–dependent movement of individuals or populations between distinct geographic regions, often driven by spatiotemporal variation in resources, breeding opportunities, or environmental conditions. It is characterized by relatively long-distance, persistent movements with clear origin and destination areas, underpinned by evolved orientation and navigation mechanisms (e.g., celestial, geomagnetic, olfactory cues). Migration can be obligate or facultative, partial or complete within a population, and plays critical roles in gene flow, metapopulation dynamics, ecological connectivity, disease spread, and responses to climate and habitat change across taxa including animals, plants (via propagule movement), and microorganisms.
An ancient DNA analysis of the remains of several mastodons, including those which roamed along the Pacific and Atlantic coasts of North America, has revealed the Ice Age giants migrated vast distances in response to shifting ...
Molecular & Computational biology
Sep 12, 2025
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226
A new study sheds light on why North America's bats are dying in large numbers at wind energy facilities.
Plants & Animals
Sep 10, 2025
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25
As climate change drives earlier spring conditions in the Arctic, bird species that travel there to breed there are under pressure to migrate faster. A new study led by researchers from the University of Amsterdam and the ...
Plants & Animals
Sep 9, 2025
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33
An AI-powered satellite counting effort conducted over two years concludes that less than 600,000 wildebeest migrate across the Serengeti-Mara ecosystem each year—half of previous estimates from manned aircraft surveys. The ...
Plants & Animals
Sep 9, 2025
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27
Now, at the end of the summer, when the thrush nightingales leave Europe for southern Africa, they do not fly at full speed. Instead, they maintain an even pace—and according to a new study in Current Biology from Lund University, ...
Plants & Animals
Sep 5, 2025
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27
When severe heat waves, droughts, and other weather-related disasters strike, age and education shape who migrates and who stays put, according to a study in Nature Communications.
Environment
Sep 4, 2025
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79
Cellular differentiation of stem cells into specialized cells requires many steps, including division, to create more cells; fate determination, which is a commitment to a specific lineage or developmental path; and migration, ...
Cell & Microbiology
Aug 28, 2025
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40
Research by the University of Southampton and University of East Anglia (UEA) shows a major shift in South Pacific climate conditions—beginning around 1,000 years ago—that may have pushed people to settle further east and ...
Earth Sciences
Aug 27, 2025
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42
In wound healing, immune response, and cancer metastasis, cells migrate through the body—often squeezing through narrow, confined spaces. Together with experimental collaborators, Professor David Bruckner at the University ...
Cell & Microbiology
Aug 26, 2025
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53
Some 390 million years ago in the ancient ocean, marine animals began colonizing depths previously uninhabited. New research indicates this underwater migration occurred in response to a permanent increase in deep-ocean oxygen, ...
Earth Sciences
Aug 25, 2025
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