https://phys.org/ en-us Phys.org internet news portal provides the latest news on science including: Physics, Nanotechnology, Life Sciences, Space Science, Earth Science, Environment, Health and Medicine. While the highly virulent avian influenza strain has only recently been discovered on Australian shores, researchers at Deakin University have been working behind the scenes for years, anticipating what an outbreak might look like. https://phys.org/news/2026-08-bird-movements-track-global-virus.html Plants & Animals Sun, 06 Sep 2026 17:00:01 EDT news707401817 A study led by the University of Jyväskylä in Finland evaluated, for the first time, an ecological threshold for the amount of clearcutting in boreal forests. According to the results, maintaining populations of bird species specialized in old-growth forests requires either a forest rotation period of at least 90 years on average or that approximately one-fifth of the forest area be excluded from clearcut management. The study provides a concrete target for the ecologically sustainable use of forests. https://phys.org/news/2026-09-clearcutting-nature-sustain-ecological-limit.html Plants & Animals Sat, 05 Sep 2026 16:30:01 EDT news707584342 Lakes may look like picturesque stopping points along a river or stream, but they can have a big influence on what happens to carbon as it moves through a landscape. New research suggests that the more lake-rich a network of streams is, the more carbon is released into the atmosphere rather than carried downstream. https://phys.org/news/2026-08-lakes-theyre-carbon.html Earth Sciences Sat, 05 Sep 2026 08:20:01 EDT news707386128 Has El Niño reached the West Coast? You might think it has. After all, the ocean off Southern and Central California is unusually warm. But that warmth is from a recent marine heat wave that predates the current El Niño. Much of the Pacific Coast is experiencing relatively normal conditions while still awaiting the impacts of what could be a very strong El Niño. https://phys.org/news/2026-09-ocean-indicators-noaa-scientists-tracking.html Earth Sciences Sat, 05 Sep 2026 07:40:01 EDT news707807952 Every 13 or 17 years, swarms of cicadas emerge from the ground, their black bodies, orange-tinged wings and ruby-red eyes enveloping trees and forests. It is a biological marvel unique in the insect world, and when it happens, it is impossible not to notice. https://phys.org/news/2026-09-periodical-cicadas-doomed-extinction.html Plants & Animals Fri, 04 Sep 2026 16:40:02 EDT news707746681 Feeding stations providing food and water for wild birds are contributing to the spread of disease-causing parasites among farmland birds, researchers have said, with birds three times more likely to catch a parasite from these resources. https://phys.org/news/2026-09-food-stations-wild-birds-contributing.html Plants & Animals Fri, 04 Sep 2026 15:20:04 EDT news707747402 Labor-intensive harvesting and complex processing make macadamias among the most expensive nuts in the world. This makes it all the more important to protect the trees from pests. https://phys.org/news/2026-09-biological-pest-south-african-macadamia.html Ecology Fri, 04 Sep 2026 13:00:01 EDT news707729701 Some of the most intriguing scientific breakthroughs happen when researchers aren't explicitly looking for them. Take, for example, the pygmy raccoon (Procyon pygmaeus), a critically endangered species that lives only on Cozumel Island, Mexico. Scientists were observing them for a study on the impact of tourism on their populations when they made an accidental discovery. https://phys.org/news/2026-09-critically-endangered-pygmy-raccoons-paper.html Plants & Animals Fri, 04 Sep 2026 10:30:02 EDT news707734698 When a strain of highly pathogenic avian influenza, or HPAI, tore through U.S. poultry farms in early 2025, farmers culled tens of millions of birds, and egg prices soared. https://phys.org/news/2026-09-ultraviolet-bird-flu-poultry.html Veterinary medicine Fri, 04 Sep 2026 07:40:03 EDT news707721546 Ever found a bare-nosed wombat napping under your house or heard a possum thumping around in your attic? https://phys.org/news/2026-09-house-haven-wildlife-homes-nature.html Plants & Animals Thu, 03 Sep 2026 22:20:01 EDT news707643067 Two tiny ant fossils recovered in southern Saskatchewan are helping scientists better understand the evolutionary history of modern ants. Ant fossils dating from 72–56 million years ago are rare. What happened to insects such as ants during this period that saw a mass extinction wipe out all non-bird dinosaurs? How did that event reshape their world? https://phys.org/news/2026-09-tiny-fossils-reveal-big-insights.html Evolution Thu, 03 Sep 2026 19:20:01 EDT news707668441 About 200 million years ago, furry, little egg-laying creatures evolved the ability to feed their offspring with a secretion from special glands: milk. Their evolutionary journey continued, and by about 160 million years ago, the first mammals with a real placenta had come into being. Instead of laying eggs, they gave birth to live young that had been connected directly to their mother via a placenta during pregnancy, allowing the exchange of oxygen, nutrients and waste products. https://phys.org/news/2026-09-early-mammals-werent-loners-pairs.html Evolution Thu, 03 Sep 2026 16:00:02 EDT news707660041 The color of penguin poop, as seen from space, is offering a new window into how Antarctica's ecology and environment are changing over time. https://phys.org/news/2026-09-satellite-images-penguins-diets-response.html Plants & Animals Thu, 03 Sep 2026 14:40:11 EDT news707656861 For insurers and operators alike, what grows under a solar array is almost as important as what sits on top of it. Grass height, moisture and biomass all influence how a site is insured, maintained and grazed. https://phys.org/news/2026-09-kind-solar-farms-grazing.html Environment Thu, 03 Sep 2026 12:20:04 EDT news707642461 Along the sandy banks of northern India's Chambal River, crocodile-like gharials glide silently through the water—but if a gharial spots a stranger, the quiet may be punctuated by a series of explosive pops. https://phys.org/news/2026-09-gharial-patterns-gecko-uncover-reptiles.html Plants & Animals Thu, 03 Sep 2026 11:20:16 EDT news707653174 Scientists at UMass Chan Medical School and the Marine Biological Laboratory at Woods Hole have shown that the four core clock genes responsible for maintaining circadian rhythms in animals—Per, Cry2, Bmal1 and Clk—also regulate circatidal behavior in the crustacean P. hawaiensis. https://phys.org/news/2026-09-tiny-crustacean-scientists-genes-circatidal.html Plants & Animals Thu, 03 Sep 2026 10:40:01 EDT news707646781 Highly pathogenic avian influenza (HPAI) featured prominently in the news during 2020 as it took the lives of millions of birds across the globe. While the worst seems to be behind us, population-level effects are just now emerging. https://phys.org/news/2026-09-ddt-flu-peregrine-falcons-san.html Plants & Animals Thu, 03 Sep 2026 09:40:03 EDT news707644561 The hidden world of quantum mechanics exists at scales many orders of magnitude smaller than living organisms, yet scientists have long theorized that quantum effects play an important role in biology. Birds' ability to sense magnetic fields during migration is one of the best-known mysteries in this field, with leading theories suggesting that this sensing could be achieved by exploiting quantum entanglement. https://phys.org/news/2026-09-quantum-algorithm-birds-migrate.html Quantum Physics Thu, 03 Sep 2026 09:20:07 EDT news707643721 More than 56 million U.S. adults feed wild birds. https://phys.org/news/2026-09-birds.html Social Sciences Thu, 03 Sep 2026 09:20:01 EDT news707635921 Earth may have been pushed deeper into a global deep freeze by something surprisingly ordinary: salt. Around 700 million years ago, Earth entered periods of extreme glaciation known as Snowball Earth, when ice is thought to have spread across much or potentially all of the planet's surface. Scientists have long known that expanding ice could have helped drive this transition: As bright ice replaces darker ocean water, more sunlight is reflected back into space, causing the planet to cool further and allowing even more ice to form. https://phys.org/news/2026-08-salt-earth-frozen-world-million.html Earth Sciences Thu, 03 Sep 2026 07:40:06 EDT news707385271 Researchers in Chile have designed an unlikely new garment for injured penguins—snug red vests threaded with copper and zinc that they hope will help the aquatic birds heal faster. https://phys.org/news/2026-09-chile-penguins-sport-copper-vests.html Plants & Animals Thu, 03 Sep 2026 04:10:54 EDT news707627422 For the first time, geographers from Durham University have used freely available satellite radar images to track emperor penguins through the polar winter—giving a year-round view of their movements. Monitoring the endangered birds through Antarctica's dark months is important because this is a key stage in their breeding cycle. Emperor penguins rely on stable sea ice attached to the coastline for roughly nine months to breed and raise chicks. https://phys.org/news/2026-09-tracking-emperor-penguins-space.html Plants & Animals Wed, 02 Sep 2026 11:20:03 EDT news707561703 On a high Norwegian plateau in late May, patches of bare ground begin to appear through the snow, and with them arrive some of Europe's most approachable birds. Eurasian dotterels breed on exposed mountain ridges and Arctic tundra from Scotland, through Scandinavia, to Siberia, and are famously tolerant of people—a trait that has long made them easy prey for hunters. They are unusual in another sense, too. https://phys.org/news/2026-09-summer-odyssey-female-dotterels-multiple.html Plants & Animals Wed, 02 Sep 2026 09:20:09 EDT news707557949 Many animal species, ranging from peacocks and birds of paradise to some lizards, fish and beetles, display physical features or ornaments that can attract potential mates. These ornaments can include colorful plumage, elaborate tails or fins, inflatable throat sacs and elongated eye stalks. https://phys.org/news/2026-09-peacock-displays-outpace-antlers-tusks.html Evolution Wed, 02 Sep 2026 07:20:05 EDT news707483354 What makes birdsong beautiful? Answering this question could help us understand how soundscapes make the natural world relaxing for humans, opening the door to improving parks, upgrading the design of stressful places like waiting rooms and promoting conservation through birds with especially lovely songs. https://phys.org/news/2026-08-scientists-key-ingredients-birdsong-pretty.html Plants & Animals Wed, 02 Sep 2026 00:00:01 EDT news707389981 Influenza viruses constantly shapeshift to evade recognition by the immune system. This shapeshifting occurs in critical proteins like hemagglutinin (HA), which controls how the virus attaches to human cells before entering them. Influenza viruses can evade immunity in two major ways: through the gradual accumulation of mutations that make HA harder for the immune system to recognize or through reassortment events that can introduce substantially different viral proteins and potentially lead to flu pandemics. To address this challenge, seasonal flu vaccines remain the primary approach because they can be developed to target the flu viruses circulating most predominantly in a given season. https://phys.org/news/2026-09-amino-acid-swap-nanoparticle-vaccine.html Bio & Medicine Tue, 01 Sep 2026 19:20:04 EDT news707502181 An environmental DNA study by a multi-institutional research collaboration has revealed distinct regions of extraordinary marine biodiversity that can help inform management of a proposed marine park in Western Australia's Exmouth Gulf. https://phys.org/news/2026-09-survey-reveals-marine-biodiversity-hotspot.html Ecology Tue, 01 Sep 2026 19:00:03 EDT news707493301 Have you ever walked across a salt flat so expansive it feels like another planet? That's what it's like standing in Egypt's coastal sabkhas—those otherworldly landscapes where the ground crunches beneath your feet and the air shimmers with heat. These aren't just barren wastelands; they're living laboratories that record the pulse of our changing climate. https://phys.org/news/2026-08-salt-earth-egypt-coastal-sabkhas.html Earth Sciences Tue, 01 Sep 2026 18:00:06 EDT news707392774 The temporal structure of speech rhythms resembles that of the communication signals of numerous animal species. This is shown by a study conducted by a research team from the Leibniz Center for General Linguistics (ZAS) in Berlin, Humboldt Universität zu Berlin, the University of Regensburg and the Institute for Advanced Studies at Aix-Marseille University. https://phys.org/news/2026-09-tune-nature-human-speech-rhythm.html Evolution Tue, 01 Sep 2026 15:40:03 EDT news707484422 The Democratic Republic of Congo's (DRC) tropical forests stretch across an extraordinary landscape of rivers, wetlands, savannas and towering trees. But in a forest this vast, biodiversity doesn't exist on a single plane. It climbs into the canopy. It moves between branches and vines, disappears into the understory and travels across the forest floor. https://phys.org/news/2026-09-forest-floor-treetops-cameras-reveal.html Plants & Animals Tue, 01 Sep 2026 13:20:03 EDT news707481541