Tag archives for evolution
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Ancient water below Canadian gold mines may offer new clues about evolution—and new life forms here on Earth.
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The greater wax moth evolved to hear better than any animal on Earth—all to avoid their nemesis, the bat, a new study says.
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A rare Ethiopian primate called the gelada makes sounds like people—giving insights into the evolution of human speech.
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By Linda Poon April Fools’ Day is when people roll out their best pranks, tricks, and other shenanigans just for the sake of a good laugh. But compared with the tricksters of the animal kingdom, we’re all just amateurs. (Related: “April Fools’ Day Pictures: Seven Animal Hoaxes.”) For nature’s masters of deception, the use of…
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A type of burrowing worm that lived 508 million years ago has solved an evolutionary puzzle, a new study says.
A cluster of tapeworm eggs have been discovered in 270 million-year-old fossilized shark feces, suggesting that the intestinal parasites are much older than previously thought.
Meet the microscopic moocher Prymnesium parvum, a strain of algae that freeloads on its kin without putting in any effort, a new study says.
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Live presentations have been a part of National Geographic since the 1800s, and today more than 140 are viewable online. See this year’s best.
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In 1835 Charles Darwin arrived on Floreana Island in the Galapagos, noting in his journal that it had long been frequented, first by buccaneers, latterly by whalers–and then political dissidents exiled from mainland South America. The giant tortoises Darwin saw on Floreana have since been extirpated from the island and the prisoners and pirates exist only in history. But the scenery he described remains much the same, and a tradition of leaving mail in a “post office barrel” for collection and delivery by passing ships has endured for two centuries.
The hen with the largest comb gets a bigger dose of sperm, and thus more chicks, according to research published this week. Roosters have figured out what poultry breeders know — combs are a reliable indicator of a hen’s ability to produce more eggs.
Hairy Skin May Keep the Bedbugs From Biting
Posted by Alyson Foster on December 20, 2011 
Time to throw out your razor? A new study indicates that having hairier skin may help a person ward off bedbugs.
Lizard Genome Promises Great Advances in Understanding Evolution
Posted by Jonathan Losos of National Geographic Committee for Research and Exploration on August 31, 2011 The genome of Anolis carolinensis has just been published in the journal Nature, and most attention is focusing on how this genome, the first reptile to be sequenced (not including birds), differs from other vertebrate genomes, and what these differences may tell us about genome evolution.
Humans and the planet that gave rise to them are at a number of important crossroads, says writer-thinker Tim Flannery. Will we go down the road that leads to destruction of our civilization and back to an existence of brutality? Or is our destiny the spread of life from Earth into the universe? How much of our fate is up to us?
Posted by The middle ear of mammals contains a chain of three tiny bones (auditory ossicles), the hammer (malleus), anvil (incus), and stirrup (stapes). This chain transmits and amplifies sound vibrations from the eardrum to the inner ear. The eardrum (tympanic membrane) itself is stretched across an additional bone, the ectotympanic. In all other land vertebrates, a…
Posted by Neil Losin is a National Geographic Young Explorer pursuing his Ph.D. in UCLA’s Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology. Losin received a grant from National Geographic in 2009 to study territorial behavior between species. The work focuses on why some animals defend their territories not only against members of their own species, but against members…
By Jesús Gómez-Zurita New Caledonia, an island archipelago east of Australia, has long been recognized as a hotspot for biodiversity, maintaining a rich and mostly endemic flora and fauna, including some emblematic examples of island oddities and living fossils. As is typically the case in the tropics, despite the obvious appeal of New Caledonia for biodiversity studies,…
Sharper Than a Serpent’s Tooth
Posted by Ford Cochran on November 24, 2010 A new study of venomous reptile fossils sheds light on the evolution of snake fangs. By Hans-Dieter Sues Venom is a highly effective means to subdue and kill prey before eating it, as well as a great defense against predators. Furthermore, studies have shown that some snake toxins can also help in breaking down proteins…
By Andrew Howley Ever since the 1940s, the “modern synthesis” has presented evolution as the result of random mutations to DNA creating altered versions of living creatures that live and reproduce or die childless based on how well they happen to fit into their environment. This idea has served well in many ways for the…
International researchers led by ancient DNA experts from the University of Adelaide, Australia, said today that they had settled the longstanding issue of the origins of the people who introduced farming to Europe some 8,000 years ago. DNA carefully extracted from a complete graveyard of Early Neolithic farmers unearthed at the town of Derenburg in…
Envy may be a deadly sin, but is it hard-coded into our genes? A Spanish economist thinks it may be part of our evolutionary inheritance. There are powerful evolutionary reasons for being envious, according to a Universidad Carlos III de Madrid (UC3M) researcher who has tried to understand the economic causes and consequences of the envy.…
Why have big cats evolved such beautiful and intriguing variation in their colors and markings? British scientists have worked out some answers. NGS stock photo of leopard by Chris Johns Detailed patterning of the spots or stripes of big cats evolved for camouflage, researchers at the University of Bristol, UK, said today. Analysis of the…
By Hans-Dieter Sues Charles Darwin noted that the oldest fossils known in his day already represented quite complex life forms such as trilobites, an immensely diverse group of extinct marine arthropods most closely related to horseshoe crabs, spiders, and their relatives. We now date these remains as middle Early Cambrian in age. Because Darwin assumed…
By Hans-Dieter Sues The oldest known birds, classified in the genus Archaeopteryx, lived near the end of the Jurassic Period (145.5 to 150.8 million years ago). Although Archaeopteryx has a fully developed plumage its skeleton still retains many features of its dinosaurian precursors, one of which is jaws with teeth. With the exception of some…
By Hans-Dieter Sues In the movie The Lost World (1997), the eccentric chaos theoretician Dr. Ian Malcolm (Jeff Goldblum) remarked on the all-too-soon apparent instability of the “Jurassic Park” world: “Life will find a way.” It always does. Some animals and plants make a living in almost unimaginably weird ways. For an evolutionary biologist like…
Why is a cardinal red or a bluebird blue? Why do some birds have plumage that is intensely colored—is it pigment, light, gender, robust health, or some combination of all four? What roles do disease, climate, and wear and tear play in this process? What does feather display signal about sexual attraction and social status?…
