Over the past ten years, the DNA sequencing revolution has revealed that mating between two different species, i.e., hybridization, once considered rare, is actually widespread across the tree of life. This came as a surprise—hybridization ...
Evolution
Dec 21, 2022
1
56
A quartet of researchers, two from the U.S. and two from Mexico, found evidence that suggests divergence time between ancestral parents can be used to predict the effects of hybridization—at least in lizards. In their paper ...
The offspring of two horses will be a horse, and the offspring of two donkeys will be a donkey. But the offspring of a horse and a donkey will be a mule. And most mules are infertile, so mules are not a species.
Plants & Animals
Nov 24, 2021
1
427
Since the beginning of civilization, humans have exploited new materials to improve their lives, from the prehistoric Stone Age, Bronze Age, and Iron Age to the modern Silicon Age. With each period came technological breakthroughs ...
Analytical Chemistry
Apr 23, 2021
0
14
Why do leopards have spots and zebras have stripes? Many biologists have tried to answer these questions and have provided interesting hypotheses, including camouflage, thermoregulation, and insect repellent. But how did ...
Plants & Animals
Dec 2, 2020
0
33
Renowned journal Proceedings of the Royal Society B has a new front cover fish: the marine angelfish. It commands star power due to a new study highlighting the remarkably high incidence of and tendency for hybridisation ...
Plants & Animals
Aug 4, 2020
0
492
Ancient humans, Neanderthals and Denisovans were genetically closer than polar bears and brown bears, and so, like the bears, were able to easily produce healthy, fertile hybrids according to a study, led by the University ...
Evolution
Jun 3, 2020
2
9236
To look at how life evolved, scientists usually turn to the fossil record, but this record is often incomplete. Researchers from the Okinawa Institute of Science and Technology Graduate University (OIST), alongside an international ...
Evolution
Apr 20, 2020
0
182
A team of University of Copenhagen researchers has compiled the first and only evidence that narwhals and beluga whales can breed successfully. DNA and stable isotope analysis of an anomalous skull from the Natural History ...
Plants & Animals
Jun 20, 2019
1
2
A hybrid bird species on the Galapagos Islands could help scientists find a way to stop an invasive fly which is killing off the hatchlings of famous Darwin's finches at an alarming rate, according to new research.
Plants & Animals
Apr 2, 2019
0
101
