Biology News

Neurons Have Emergency Back-Up System, Neuroscientists Say

Dhoundiyal et al. discovered that neurons have an emergency back-up system to enable them to remain functional even when their energy supply is disrupted. Image credit: Colin Behrens.
Aug 29, 2022 by News Staff

The newly-discovered neuronal back-up system safeguards metabolic flexibility of neurons to cope with energy demands of electrical signaling, according to a team of researchers from the Center of Physiology and Pharmacology at the Medical University of Vienna. Dhoundiyal et al. discovered that neurons have an emergency back-up system to enable them to remain functional even when their energy supply is disrupted. Image credit: Colin Behrens. In their...

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The four living sirenian species and the recently extinct Steller’s sea cow; figured body sizes are at relative scale. Image credit: Christy Holton / S. Heritage & E.R. Seiffert, doi: 10.7717/peerj.13886.

New Research Tracks Evolution of Sea Cows

Aug 25, 2022 by News Staff

The sea cows originated in the Tethys Sea, between southern Europe and northern Africa, during the latest part of the Paleocene epoch, according to a new...

Larva of Hemidactylium scutatum, a species of lungless salamander native to eastern North America. Image credit: Zachary R. Lewis.

Lungless Salamanders Develop Lungs as Embryos, New Study Confirms

Aug 18, 2022 by News Staff

In a new study published this week in the journal Science Advances, scientists used morphological, molecular, and experimental approaches to examine members...

Rhipidoglossum pareense. Image credit: A. Hemp.

New Species of Orchid Discovered in Tanzania

Aug 16, 2022 by Enrico de Lazaro

Rhipidoglossum pareense is endemic to the South Pare and West Usambara mountains of north-eastern Tanzania. Rhipidoglossum pareense. Image credit: A. Hemp. “Rhipidoglossum...

Paruroctonus soda and Paruroctonus conclusus scorpions were initially discovered on the community platform iNaturalist. Image credit: Gayle Laird, California Academy of Sciences.

Two New Scorpion Species Discovered in California

Aug 15, 2022 by News Staff

Harper Forbes and Prakrit Jain, high school students from California’s Bay Area, have discovered two new species of the scorpion genus Paruroctonus. Paruroctonus...

The larynx is an organ in the top of the neck involved in breathing, producing sound and protecting the trachea against food aspiration. Image credit: OpenStax College / CC BY 3.0.

Simplified Voice Box Enabled Complex Humans Speech, New Research Suggests

Aug 12, 2022 by News Staff

Human speech and language are highly complex, consisting of a large number of sounds. The human larynx (voice box) has acquired the capability to create...

Bathynomus yucatanensis, body length 26 cm: (a) dorsal view, (b) ventral view. Each square is 1 cm on a side. Image credit: Huang et al., doi: 10.1080/00222933.2022.2086835.

Marine Biologists Discover New Species of Giant Isopod

Aug 10, 2022 by Natali Anderson

Isopod crustaceans, including members of the deep-sea genus Bathynomus, are distantly related to their better-known decapod relatives: the crabs, shrimp,...

Embryological series of Japanese quail (Coturnix coturnix japonica) showing the transition from ancestral to derived pelvic states across avian prehatching ontogeny: (a) pelvic reconstructions along the evolutionary transition to living birds; note that pelves are shown as examples of character states and are not in one-to-one correspondence with ontogenetic stages; (b) during ontogeny, the ilium extends first posteriorly and then anteriorly, the pubis retroverts, the tail becomes relatively reduced and a transient pubic boot appears at intermediate ontogenetic stages; (c) the CFL (M. caudofemoralis longus homologue) is large during early ontogenetic stages; the IF (M. iliofemoralis homologue) originates smaller and further back on the ilium before expanding anteriorly to the derived condition and never splits into two muscles as seen in the adult; and PIFE1+2 (Mm. puboischiofemoralis externus 1 et 2 homologues) fail to fully differentiate until after the pubis is retroverted; muscles that are not highlighted are in gray; (d) the derived pelvic spinal nerve arrangement in birds (top), with additional spinal nerves contributing to the sacral plexus and nerves in Coturnix embryos (bottom). Scale bars - 1 mm in (b and d), 2 mm in (c). Image credit: Griffin et al., doi: 10.1038/s41586-022-04982-w.

Study: Developing Bird Hip Bone Passes through Ancestral Dinosaurian Conditions

Aug 8, 2022 by News Staff

Living birds have bodies substantially modified from the ancestral reptilian condition. The bird pelvis (hip bone) in particular experienced major changes...

This image shows a male Santa Marta sabrewing (Campylopterus phainopeplus); male Santa Marta sabrewings are green with a blue throat, and females are green above and mostly white below; both sexes have a white spot behind the eye and lack copper in the tail; the Santa Marta sabrewing had not had a documented sighting in 13 years; it is only the third time the hummingbird has been documented since it was described by science in 1946. Image credit: Yurgen Vega / SELVA / ProCAT.

Santa Marta Sabrewing: Elusive and Spectacular Hummingbird Species Rediscovered in Colombia

Aug 8, 2022 by News Staff

A poorly known species of hummingbird called the Santa Marta sabrewing (Campylopterus phainopeplus) has been unexpectedly rediscovered in the highlands...

Alemayehu Tassew et al. confirm that, in addition to the selective hand-picking of red-ripe berries, better quality coffees can be obtained by using the dry processing method within the recommended range of green bean moisture content. Image credit: Daniel Ramirez.

Best Coffees Come from Selectively Hand-Picked, Sundried Red-Ripe Cherries, Study Confirms

Aug 5, 2022 by News Staff

Researchers have carried out a comprehensive physical and cup quality assessment of Arabica coffee (Coffea arabica) from three regions in the Kafa Biosphere...

Dorsal, lateral, and ventral views of Pegasus sinensis. Image credit: Xin Wang

Bizarre New Species of Fish Found in East China Sea

Aug 5, 2022 by Natali Anderson

Marine biologists have discovered a new species of the seamoth genus Pegasus living in the coastal waters of Xiamen City, Fujian Province, China. Dorsal,...

Gibbons et al. showed that bumblebees are capable of modifying their response to noxious stimuli in order to get a higher sugar reward. Image credit: Ralphs Fotos.

Bumblebees Can Experience Pain, New Study Claims

Aug 3, 2022 by News Staff

Insects are traditionally thought to respond to noxious stimuli in an inflexible manner, without the ability to modulate their behavior according to context....

Mechanisms of Nepenthes gracilis. Image credit: Anne-Kristin Lenz & Ulrike Bauer, doi: 10.1098/rsbl.2022.0106.

Carnivorous Pitcher Plant from Asia Uses Rain Energy to Power Its Traps

Aug 3, 2022 by News Staff

The cup-shaped leaves of Nepenthes gracilis, or the slender pitcher plant, are equipped with a canopy-like hanging lid that turns into a ‘springboard’...

LifeGate 2022 combines up-to-date phylogenetic knowledge with a graphical display of the richness and aesthetics of life on Earth. Image credit: Martin Freiberg / Leipzig University.

New Interactive Phylogenetic Map Shows Full Diversity of Life on Earth

Jul 29, 2022 by News Staff

LifeGate 2022, created by Leipzig University researcher Martin Freiberg, is an attempt to arrange all known species (about 2.6 million) in an interactive...

The whale shark (Rhincodon typus). Image credit: Andre Rerekura, Whaleshark Research.

Whale Shark is World’s Largest Omnivore, New Study Shows

Jul 25, 2022 by News Staff

The whale shark (Rhincodon typus), which have been reported up to 18 m long, is the largest known extant fish species. This creatrure is a filter feeder...

Gloydius lateralis. Image credit: Sheng-chao Shi.

Researchers Discover New Species of Venomous Snake in China

Jul 25, 2022 by Natali Anderson

Scientists from the Institute of Vertebrate Paleontology and Paleoanthropology at the Chinese Academy of Sciences have discovered a new species of the...

A molecular phylogeny of Lepidoptera indicating antipredator ultrasound production across the order. Image credit: Barber et al., doi: 10.1073/pnas.2117485119.

Moths Produce Ultrasonic Defensive Sounds to Fend Off Bat Predators

Jul 22, 2022 by News Staff

Scientists from Boise State University and elsewhere have tested 252 genera from most families of large-bodied moths. Their results show that ultrasound-producing...

An assistant referee with a flag. Image credit: Chiraphat Phaungmala.

Soccer’s VAR Technology Is Not Precise Enough to Make Accurate Offside Decisions, Study Says

Jul 20, 2022 by News Staff

New research suggests that Video Assistant Referee (VAR) technology in soccer is useful for preventing obvious mistakes but is not precise enough to give...

Desmognathus gvnigeusgwotli in life, from Straight Fork, Great Smoky Mountains, North Carolina. Image credit: Todd Pierson, Kennesaw State University.

Three New Cryptic Salamander Species Discovered

Jul 20, 2022 by News Staff

All of the three new species belong to the salamander genus Desmognathus and are found in the southern Appalachian Mountains of the eastern United States,...

Li et al. systematically examined horizontal gene transfer in 218 high-quality genomes of diverse insects and found that they acquired 1,410 genes exhibiting diverse functions, including many not previously reported, via 741 distinct transfers from non-metazoan donors. Image credit: Li et al., doi: 10.1016/j.cell.2022.06.014.

Insects Carry 1,410 Horizontally-Transferred Microbial Genes: Study

Jul 19, 2022 by News Staff

In new research, a team of scientists from Zhejiang University and Vanderbilt University examined horizontal gene transfer — an important evolutionary...

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