A new, absorbable material from Empa wood research could be of assistance in future oil spill accidents: a chemically modified nanocellulose sponge. The light material absorbs the oil spill, remains floating on the surface ...
Materials Science
May 6, 2014
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Sponges are usually considered to be the oldest living animals, having evolved before all other groups. The simplicity of their body structure and tissue organization has for many years made them candidates for the ancestral ...
Plants & Animals
Apr 29, 2014
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Killer sponges sound like creatures from a B-grade horror movie. In fact, they thrive in the lightless depths of the deep sea. Scientists first discovered that some sponges are carnivorous about 20 years ago. Since then only ...
Plants & Animals
Apr 14, 2014
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A UNSW-led team of researchers studying bottlenose dolphins that use sponges as tools has shown that social behaviour can shape the genetic makeup of an animal population in the wild.
Plants & Animals
Mar 18, 2014
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Scientists had already demonstrated that overfishing removes angelfish and parrotfish that feed on sponges growing on coral reefs—sponges that sometimes smother the reefs. That research was conducted off Key Largo, Fla.
Environment
Feb 25, 2014
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Sponge gardens along WA's coast are proving to be a haven of new species—and many are playing an important role in new drug discoveries.
Plants & Animals
Feb 21, 2014
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One of science's strongest dogmas is that complex life on Earth could only evolve when oxygen levels in the atmosphere rose to close to modern levels. But now studies of a small sea sponge fished out of a Danish fjord shows ...
Earth Sciences
Feb 17, 2014
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Sponges are an important animal for marine and freshwater ecology and represent a rich animal diversity found throughout the world, from tropical climates to the arctic poles. For evolutionary biologists, they also present ...
Evolution
Feb 4, 2014
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Sponges are unique beings: they are invertebrates that live in symbiosis with sometimes hundreds of different types of bacteria; similar to lichens which are a biocoenosis of algae and fungi. "Put simply, many sponges are ...
Cell & Microbiology
Jan 29, 2014
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The sea sponge is about as simple as an animal can get, but its associated bacterial community—its microbiome —is known to approach the complexity of the diverse microbiome in the human gut.
Cell & Microbiology
Jan 21, 2014
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