Biology News

Bonobos Demonstrate Imaginative Ability in New Experiments

Kanzi the bonobo. Image credit: Ape Initiative.
Feb 5, 2026 by News Staff

The consistent performance of Kanzi the bonobo in pretend play experiments suggests that the mental capacity to imagine nonexistent objects may trace back 6 to 9 million years, rewriting assumptions about the uniqueness of human imagination. Kanzi the bonobo. Image credit: Ape Initiative. “It really is game-changing that their mental lives go beyond the here and now,” said Dr. Christopher Krupenye, a researcher at Johns Hopkins University. “Imagination...

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European bee-eaters (Merops apiaster). Image credit: Rashuli / CC BY 2.0.

New Online Tool Charts Evolution of Every Known Bird Species

Jan 29, 2026 by News Staff

Ornithologists with the Cornell Lab of Ornithology have stitched together the most complete avian evolutionary tree ever, unveiling surprising relationships...

Resurrection and characterization of ancestral nitrogenases. Image credit: Rucker et al., doi: 10.1038/s41467-025-67423-y.

Biologists ‘Resurrect’ 3.2-Billion-Year-Old Enzyme

Jan 22, 2026 by News Staff

A team of researchers led by the University of Wisconsin-Madison has reverse-engineered a primordial nitrogen-fixing enzyme, illuminating how life thrived...

Veronika’s tooling technique. Image credit: Antonio Osuna-Mascaró & Alice Auersperg, doi: 10.1016/j.cub.2025.11.059.

Researchers Observe Tool Use in Cattle for the First Time

Jan 19, 2026 by News Staff

In a paper published today in the journal Current Biology, researchers at the University of Veterinary Medicine, Vienna, report the first experimental...

The rockhead poacher (Bothragonus swanii) in Oregon Coast Aquarium. Image credit: Rhinopias / CC BY-SA 4.0.

Scientist Finds Built-In Drum in Head of Weird-Looking Fish

Jan 13, 2026 by Natali Anderson

A fish species called the armored rockhead poacher (Bothragonus swanii) carries a secret that has confounded marine biologists for decades: a deep, bowl-shaped...

The International Space Station is seen with Earth in the background. Image credit: NASA.

Microgravity on International Space Station Alters Coevolution of Bacteriophages and Their Hosts

Jan 13, 2026 by News Staff

In new experiments aboard the International Space Station (ISS), microbiologists from the University of Wisconsin-Madison and Rhodium Scientific Inc. have...

The Beni greenlet (Hylophilus moxensis) in habitat near San Ramón, Beni, Bolivia, on January 10, 2024. Notice the pale brownish gray auriculars, combined with dark lores, dark base of commissure, rufous on the entire crown and frons, and dark irides. Image credit: Tini Wijpkema.

New Songbird Species Discovered in Bolivia

Jan 5, 2026 by Natali Anderson

Deep in the seasonally flooded savannas of Bolivia, a small, olive-green songbird has been quietly eluding science. Now, after six decades of confusion...

DeCasien et al. provide the first empirical data showing the direct role the gut microbiome plays in shaping differences in the way the brain functions across different primate species. Image credit: DeCasien et al., doi: 10.1073/pnas.2426232122.

Gut Microbes Played Role in Evolution of Human Brain, New Study Suggests

Jan 5, 2026 by News Staff

Compared to other primates, humans have remarkably large brains relative to their body sizes. The resultant high demands for glucose may have been supported...

An individual of Tinamus resonans at Morro Queimado, Serra do Divisor National Park, Mâncio Lima, Acre, Brazil. Image credit: Luis A. Morais.

New Species of Tinamou Discovered in Brazil

Dec 29, 2025 by Natali Anderson

Ornithologists have discovered a new species of tinamou living in the montane forests of the Serra do Divisor, western Amazonia, Brazil. An individual...

Falk et al. show that the geometry of melanosomes in the eyespots of fossil frogs from the Miocene and Eocene is similar to that of ocular melanosomes in living frogs. Image credit: Falk et al., doi: 10.1016/j.isci.2025.114220.

Study Sheds New Light on Evolutionary Success of Frogs

Dec 29, 2025 by News Staff

Frogs have conserved their ecology in the last 45 million years, according to new research led by University College Cork. Falk et al. show that the geometry...

The evolution of antibiotic resistance genes is linked to intrinsic physiological roles and ecological divisions. Image credit: Xu et al., doi: 10.48130/biocontam-0025-0014.

Antibiotic Resistance is Ancient Feature of Microbial Life, New Review Says

Dec 25, 2025 by News Staff

The dissemination of antibiotic resistance genes poses a severe and global threat to public health. A new comprehensive review by Hohai University scientists...

Male of Ptilorrhoa urrissia photographed on January 15, 2020. Image credit: Woxvold et al., doi: 10.1111/ibi.70016.

New Species of Bird Discovered in Papua New Guinea

Dec 22, 2025 by Natali Anderson

Using camera traps, ornithologists have photographed a previously unknown species of jewel-babbler in the forested karst of the Southern Fold Mountains...

German Shepherd puppy. Image credit: Marilyn Peddle / CC BY 2.0.

Almost Two-Thirds of Breed Dogs Have Wolf Ancestry, Study Shows

Nov 25, 2025 by News Staff

Although dogs (Canis lupus familiaris) and wolves (Canis lupus) can interbreed and produce fertile offspring, hybridization between the two is far more...

Physcomitrium patens spores survive simulated space conditions with high resilience. Image credit: Maeng et al., doi: 10.1016/j.isci.2025.113827.

Moss Can Survive Long-Term Exposure to Elements of Space, New Experiments Show

Nov 25, 2025 by News Staff

A team of researchers from Japan has tested protenemata (juvenile moss), brood cells (specialized stem cells that emerge under stress conditions) and sporophytes...

Maldarelli & Güntürkün show that there is growing evidence that (i) birds have sensory and self-awareness, and (ii) they also have the neural architecture that may be necessary for this. Image credit: Kutte.

Birds May Possess Fundamental Forms of Conscious Perception: Study

Nov 25, 2025 by News Staff

In their new paper in the Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B, Ruhr University Bochum researchers Gianmarco Maldarelli and Onur Güntürkün...

Composite representation of the complete Bas63 virion. Image credit: Hodgkinson-Bean et al., doi: 10.1126/sciadv.adx0790.

Scientists Explore Structure of Bacteriophage

Nov 18, 2025 by News Staff

Using cryo-electron microscopy, researchers have investigated the structure of Bas63, a bacteriophage of the subfamily Ounavirinae and the Felixounavirus...

Tea plant (Camellia sinensis). Image credit: Yonghan Kim.

Researchers Identify Gene Responsible for Bud Size in Tea Plant

Nov 17, 2025 by News Staff

Tea plant (Camellia sinensis) is among the most significant beverage crops globally. The size of tea buds not only directly affects the yield and quality...

The buff-tailed bumblebee (Bombus terrestris). Image credit: Myriam.

Study: Bumblebees Can Be Trained to Read Simple ‘Morse Code’

Nov 17, 2025 by News Staff

Buff-tailed bumblebees (Bombus terrestris) can decide where to forage for food based on different durations of visual cues, according to new research. The...

The new Megachile species. Image credit: Kit Prendergast & Joshua Campbell, doi: 10.3897/jhr.98.166350.

Females of New Australian Native Bee Species Have Pair of Large ‘Horns’

Nov 12, 2025 by News Staff

The newly-discovered bee species belongs to the genus Megachile and is a visitor to a critically endangered flowering plant species called Marianthus aquilonaris. The...

Chen et al. carried out two studies: the first, a human study assessing fingertip sensitivity to tactile cues from buried objects; the second, a robotic experiment using a tactile-equipped robotic arm and a Long Short-Term Memory model to detect object presence. Image credit: Gemini AI.

Humans Have Form of ‘Remote Touch,’ Scientists Claim

Nov 10, 2025 by News Staff

Humans possess the ability to sense objects without direct contact, a sense that some animals have, according to new research. Chen et al. carried out...

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