When UC Santa Cruz postdoctoral scholar Merly Escalona assembled the first-ever reference genome for the Stephen Colbert Trapdoor Spider, she was shocked by the dataset's unexpectedly large size. For a small invertebrate, ...
CABI has confirmed a new species of fungus after the BBC Springwatch show called on Dr. Harry Evans' expertise when the mysterious specimen was first discovered in a Victorian gunpowder store at Castle Espie wetland center ...
Silk has been cultivated for centuries by domesticated silkworms, but it has been difficult to commercially produce spider silk in bulk due to their cannibalistic tendencies. However, spider silk fibers are attracting attention ...
A new study of huntsman spiders links evolutionary lineages with life history traits, providing patterns for predicting social behaviors in other less-studied species. Sociality is very rare in spiders—only five out of ...
Flies, mosquitoes, dust and even microplastics—spider webs capture whatever travels through the air. Researchers at the university have now for the first time tested if they can get an overview of plastic particles in the ...
Some male wolf spiders seem to get luckier than others when it comes to courting females. The secret of their courtship? It's complicated, says a new study led by the University of Nebraska–Lincoln.
Most people recognize a wasp as those stripy insects who ruin our summer picnics. They live in huge societies, much the same as the honeybee; you might even have a nest in your loft or shed. But there's a lot more to wasps ...
NASA is planning a mission to demonstrate the ability to repair and upgrade satellites in Earth orbit. The mission, called OSAM-1 (On-orbit Servicing, Assembly, and Manufacturing-1), will send a robotic spacecraft equipped ...
Newly published research led by Northumbria University shows that, contrary to what is commonly believed, the venom of snakes and spiders is actually populated with microbes, including bacteria that could cause infection ...
For a creature that—legs and all—might be no larger than a pencil eraser, spiders continue to surprise researchers with their cognitive abilities.
