A sea otter's survival depends on their ability to catch and eat prey. Unlike most marine mammals, sea otters lack a thick layer of blubber to insulate them from the frigid waters of the Pacific Ocean. Instead, they rely ...
Plants & Animals
Oct 25, 2017
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137
A new high-definition genome sequence of the sea cucumber provides molecular insights into its ability to regenerate, according to a new study publishing 12 October in the open access journal PLOS Biology by Xiaojun Zhang, ...
Biotechnology
Oct 12, 2017
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446
Genes which determine animal complexity – or what makes humans so much more complex than a fruit fly or a sea urchin – have been identified for the first time.
Biotechnology
Sep 29, 2017
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693
(Phys.org)—A team of researchers from the U.K. and the U.S. has identified the remains of a 430-million-year-old extinct echinoderm found in a fossil bed in Herefordshire, England. In their paper published in Proceedings ...
When diving in the Gulf of Maine a few years back, Jennifer Dijkstra expected to be swimming through a flowing kelp forest that had long served as a nursery and food for juvenile fish and lobster.
Ecology
Aug 22, 2017
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500
Despite popular metaphors and cartoons depicting straightforward "food chains," ecologists such as Brown University Professor Jon Witman typically doubt that they'll see predators in diverse tropical ecosystems have meaningful ...
Ecology
May 1, 2017
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210
Marine reserves play an important role in sustaining ecosystem diversity and abundance. Their presence enables certain species to return to a natural size structure, which enables predators to control destructive prey.
Ecology
Jan 25, 2017
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8
Thirty years ago a mysterious disease wiped out long-spined black sea urchins across the Caribbean, leading to massive algal overgrowth that smothered already overfished coral reefs. Now, marine biologists at the Smithsonian ...
Environment
Jan 5, 2017
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47
Some sea creatures cover themselves with hard shells and spines, while vertebrates build skeletons out of the same minerals. How do these animals get the calcium they need to build these strong mineral structures? Professors ...
Cell & Microbiology
Dec 5, 2016
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5
The balmy waters of the Caribbean could turn into a deadly heat trap for countless tiny creatures. Authors of a new study conducted at the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute (STRI) in Panama discovered that microscopic ...
Environment
Aug 15, 2016
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16
