Birdsong independent of brain size

(PhysOrg.com) -- The brains of all vertebrates display gender-related differences. In songbirds, for example, the size of the brain areas that control their singing behaviour could be linked to the size of their song repertoires. ...

Crop yield in maize influenced by unexpected gene 'moonlighting'

Maize is a staple crop that came from humble beginnings. If you look at its wild ancestor, teosinte, the plant looks nearly unrecognizable. Human selection has persuaded the maize plant to grow in a way that produces higher ...

Saved by junk DNA

VIB researchers linked to K.U.Leuven and Harvard University show that stretches of DNA previously believed to be useless 'junk' DNA play a vital role in the evolution of our genome. They found that unstable pieces of junk ...

The TALE of new tools to study gene regulation

In nearly every organism's genome, scattered between genes that encode proteins, long regulatory regions stretch across expanses of DNA. Understanding what role these so-called enhancer regions play in controlling the activation ...

What causes hybrid vigor?

Plant scientists at the John Innes Centre have provided a new solution to an old debate on why species hybrids can be more vigourous than their parents. In a study to be published online next week in the online open access ...

Researchers measure gene activity in single cells

For biologists, a single cell is a world of its own: It can form a harmonious part of a tissue, or go rogue and take on a diseased state, like cancer. But biologists have long struggled to identify and track the many different ...

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