Topic description and stories

Artist鈥檚 reconstruction of the community at Lower Mistaken Point

Why life on Earth first got big

25 Jun 2018

Some of the earliest complex organisms on Earth 鈥 possibly some of the earliest animals to exist 鈥 got big not to compete for food, but to spread...

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Mass burial of battle victims from the Xiongnu period in Omnogobi, Mongolia, from which scientists extracted ancient DNA from for the study.

Oldest genetic evidence of Hepatitis B virus found in ancient DNA from 4,500 year-old skeletons

09 May 2018

An extinct strain of the human Hepatitis B virus (HBV) has been discovered in Bronze Age human skeletons found in burial sites across Europe and Asia...

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Birds learn from each other鈥檚 鈥榙isgust鈥, enabling insects to evolve bright colours

18 Dec 2017

A new study of TV-watching great tits reveals how they learn through observation. Social interactions within a predator species can have 鈥...

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Dermal denticles on the tail of the Little Skate, as used in the latest research.

Ancient fish scales and vertebrate teeth share an embryonic origin

20 Nov 2017

Latest findings support the theory that teeth in the animal kingdom evolved from the jagged scales of ancient fish, the remnants of which can be seen...

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Femoral head bones of different hominin species. From top to bottom: Australopithecus afarensis (4-3 million years; ~40 kg, 130 cm); Homo ergaster (1.9-1.4 million years; 55-60 kg; ~165 cm); Neanderthal (200.000-30.000 years; ~70 kg; ~163 cm).

Height and weight evolved at different speeds in the bodies of our ancestors

08 Nov 2017

探花直播largest study to date of body sizes over millions of years finds a 鈥減ulse and stasis鈥 pattern to hominin evolution, with surges of growth in...

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Lead researcher Dr Danny Longman rowing with the Cambridge  探花直播 Boat Club. This is an example of the type and standard of the sample population used in the study.

'Selfish brain' wins out when competing with muscle power, study finds

20 Oct 2017

New research on our internal trade-off when physical and mental performance are put in direct competition has found that cognition takes less of a...

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Top: petals of Ursinia speciosa, a daisy, contain a dark pigment that appears blue due to 'disordered' striations. Bottom: close-up top and side view of microscopic striations.

Petals produce a 'blue halo' that helps bees find flowers

18 Oct 2017

New study finds 鈥渕essy鈥 microscopic structures on petals of some flowers manipulate light to produce a blue colour effect that is easily seen by bee...

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Meet the hominin species that gave us genital herpes

02 Oct 2017

New research uses innovative data modelling to predict which species acted as an intermediary between our ancestors and those of chimpanzees to carry...

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 探花直播Ediacaran fossil Dickinsonia costata, specimen P40135 from the collections of the South Australia Museum, Adelaide

鈥楳ysterious鈥 ancient creature was definitely an animal, research confirms

15 Sep 2017

It lived well over 550 million years ago, is known only through fossils and has variously been described as looking a bit like a jellyfish, a worm, a...

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Life reconstruction of Chilesaurus diegosuarezi

Study identifies dinosaur 鈥榤issing link鈥

16 Aug 2017

A 鈥楩rankenstein鈥檚 monster鈥 dinosaur may be the missing link between two major dinosaur groups, plugging what was previously a big gap between them...

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Fossilised Teleosaster creasyi, from the Cundlefo Formation, Gascoyne Junction, Western Australia

Meadow of dancing brittle stars shows evolution at work

14 Aug 2017

Newly-described fossil shows how brittle stars evolved in response to pressure from predators, and how an 鈥榚volutionary hangover鈥 managed to escape...

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ISS013-E-24184 (23 May 2006) --- Eruption of Cleveland Volcano, Aleutian Islands, Alaska is featured in this image photographed by an Expedition 13 crewmember on the International Space Station.

Link identified between continental breakup, volcanic carbon emissions and evolution

20 Jul 2017

Researchers have found that the formation and breakup of supercontinents over hundreds of millions of years controls volcanic carbon emissions. The...

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