A scientific expedition to the Galapagos Islands will spend ten days searching for relatives of two tortoise species believed to be extinct, including those of the archipelago's Lonesome George, park officials said Friday.
Plants & Animals
Jan 25, 2020
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390
Job done, prolific Galapagos giant tortoise Diego is being released back into the wild after being credited by authorities with almost single-handedly saving his species from extinction.
Ecology
Jan 11, 2020
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259
Few topics arouse as much interest and controversy as sex. This is hardly surprising. The biological continuance of the species hinges on it—if human beings stopped having sex, there would soon be no more human beings. ...
Evolution
Oct 22, 2019
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28
What shapes a river? People typically imagine large-scale processes such as storms and floods or human modifications like dams or fortified banks. But the shape of our rivers today is also a result of the cumulative impact ...
Plants & Animals
Oct 16, 2019
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6
When we speak, our sentences emerge as a flowing stream of sound. Unless we are really annoyed, We. Don't. Speak. One. Word. At. A. Time. But this property of speech is not how language itself is organized. Sentences consist ...
Social Sciences
Sep 03, 2019
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24
It has long been thought that the brain size of anthropoid primates—a diverse group of modern and extinct monkeys, humans, and their nearest kin—progressively increased over time. New research on one of the oldest and ...
Archaeology & Fossils
Aug 21, 2019
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2145
The alligator gar, a toothy, narrow-snouted fish that resembles its namesake reptile, is the largest, native, freshwater predator in North America. They live primarily in Arkansas, Louisiana and Texas and can grow up to 10 ...
Plants & Animals
Aug 20, 2019
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78
Fossilised flies that lived 54 million years ago have revealed a surprising twist to the tale of how insects' eyes evolved. These craneflies, unveiled in Nature today, show that insect eyes trap light the same way as human ...
Archaeology & Fossils
Aug 15, 2019
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600
The Galápagos Islands finches named after Charles Darwin are starting to sing a different tune because of an introduced pest on the once pristine environment.
Plants & Animals
Jun 11, 2019
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112
A Proba-V view of the internationally protected, volcanic archipelago of the Galápagos and its surrounding marine reserve. This island chain is renowned for its many endemic species that were studied by Charles Darwin, directly ...
Environment
Mar 27, 2019
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3
Charles Robert Darwin FRS (12 February 1809 – 19 April 1882) was an English naturalist[I] who realised and presented compelling evidence that all species of life have evolved over time from common ancestors, through the process he called natural selection. The fact that evolution occurs became accepted by the scientific community and much of the general public in his lifetime, while his theory of natural selection came to be widely seen as the primary explanation of the process of evolution in the 1930s, and now forms the basis of modern evolutionary theory. In modified form, Darwin’s scientific discovery is the unifying theory of the life sciences, explaining the diversity of life.
At Edinburgh University Darwin neglected medical studies to investigate marine invertebrates, then the University of Cambridge encouraged a passion for natural science. His five-year voyage on HMS Beagle established him as an eminent geologist whose observations and theories supported Charles Lyell’s uniformitarian ideas, and publication of his journal of the voyage made him famous as a popular author. Puzzled by the geographical distribution of wildlife and fossils he collected on the voyage, Darwin investigated the transmutation of species and conceived his theory of natural selection in 1838. Although he discussed his ideas with several naturalists, he needed time for extensive research and his geological work had priority. He was writing up his theory in 1858 when Alfred Russel Wallace sent him an essay which described the same idea, prompting immediate joint publication of both of their theories.
His 1859 book On the Origin of Species established evolutionary descent with modification as the dominant scientific explanation of diversification in nature. He examined human evolution and sexual selection in The Descent of Man, and Selection in Relation to Sex, followed by The Expression of the Emotions in Man and Animals. His research on plants was published in a series of books, and in his final book, he examined earthworms and their effect on soil.
In recognition of Darwin’s pre-eminence, he was one of only five 19th-century UK non-royal personages to be honoured by a state funeral, and was buried in Westminster Abbey, close to John Herschel and Isaac Newton.
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