As humans, we experience an amazing world of colour, but what can other animals see? Some see much more than us, but how they use this vision is largely unknown.
Plants & Animals
Sep 4, 2013
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The Xerces blue butterfly was last seen flapping its iridescent periwinkle wings in San Francisco in the early 1940s. It's generally accepted to be extinct, the first American insect species destroyed by urban development, ...
Plants & Animals
Jul 20, 2021
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(Phys.org) —A pair of researchers with the Florida Museum of Natural History at the University of Florida has conducted a through genetic analysis of butterflies and moths and in the process has revealed some of their evolutionary ...
A new study from Columbia Engineering and Harvard identified the critical physiological importance of suitable temperatures for butterfly wings to function properly, and discovered that the insects exquisitely regulate their ...
Plants & Animals
Jan 28, 2020
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Researchers have used artificial intelligence to make new discoveries, and confirm old ones, about one of nature's best-known mimics, opening up whole new directions of research in evolutionary biology.
Evolution
Aug 14, 2019
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On a suburban street with smooth lawns and trimmed bushes, Martha Chiplis' yard stands out. It's not just the wildflowers: purple wild petunia, golden lanceleaf coreopsis, hot-pink Bush's poppy mallow. It's the lemon-yellow ...
Plants & Animals
Aug 24, 2023
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Using a quantum computer to simulate time travel, researchers have demonstrated that, in the quantum realm, there is no "butterfly effect." In the research, information—qubits, or quantum bits—'time travel' into the simulated ...
Quantum Physics
Jul 29, 2020
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In the face of scientific dogma that faults the population decline of monarch butterflies on a lack of milkweed, herbicides and genetically modified crops, a new Cornell University study casts wider blame: sparse autumnal ...
Ecology
Apr 22, 2016
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The caterpillar form of an unassuming, small, white butterfly is among the world's most invasive pests affecting agricultural crops, and a newly published paper by a consortium of scientists documents how humans have helped ...
Ecology
Sep 11, 2019
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(Phys.org) —Scientists have used selective breeding to create purple wings on the normally brown-winged butterfly Bicyclus anynana. Antonia Monteiro and her colleagues selected butterflies with wing scales that reflected ...
A butterfly is an insect of the order Lepidoptera. Like all Lepidoptera, butterflies are notable for their unusual life cycle with a larval caterpillar stage, an inactive pupal stage, and a spectacular metamorphosis into a familiar and colourful winged adult form. Most species are day-flying so they regularly attract attention. The diverse patterns formed by their brightly coloured wings and their erratic yet graceful flight have made butterfly watching a hobby.
Butterflies comprise the true butterflies (superfamily Papilionoidea), the skippers (superfamily Hesperioidea) and the moth-butterflies (superfamily Hedyloidea). Butterflies exhibit polymorphism, mimicry and aposematism. Some migrate over long distances. Some butterflies have evolved symbiotic and parasitic relationships with social insects such as ants. Butterflies are important economically as agents of pollination. In addition, a few species are pests, because they can damage domestic crops and trees in their larval stage.
Culturally, butterflies are a popular motif in the visual and literary arts.
This text uses material from Wikipedia, licensed under CC BY-SA
