Aaron Foster/Getty ImagesEver since the Cambrian blast 538.8 million years earlier-- a time when most of the animal phyla we're familiar with today were established-- 5 significant mass extinction events have whittled down the biodiversity of all creatures, great and tiny.Researchers from the United States have uncovered proof of one happening earlier, around 550...
The Heterobrachia was little affected by the end-Triassic mass extinction, possibly because of a flexible mode of feeding of the larvae, an adaptation to relatively warm temperatures, and a flexible attachment of the mantle that allowed for covering the shell. Credit: Mariel Ferrari, CC-BY 4.0 (creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/)A set of investigators, one with Instituto Patagónico de...
Utilizing old DNA, consisting of examples of human remains roughly 45,000 years, has shed light on a previously unknown facet of human development.Dr. Yassine Souilmi, Team Leader at the College of Adelaide's Australian Center for Old DNA, co-led the recent research study released in Nature Ecology and Development."It was extensively thought the genes of...
Rocks created from hydrothermal vent precipitates on the seafloor. Dominic PapineauScientists get long pondered how and when the evolution of prokaryotes to eukaryotes happened. A collaborative research group from Tohoku University and the College of Tokyo may have offered some answers after discovering new kinds of microfossils dating 1.9 billion years.Details of their findings were...
A Powerful X-ray scanning techniques revealed the 1mm creature in perfect detail. Credit: P Donoghue et al/University of Bristol.Researchers share that they have solved an evolutionary puzzle of a 500 million-year-old microscopic, creature with a mouth yet no anus.When discovered in 2017, it was reported that the small sack-like aquatic creature's fossil might be...
Mitochondria are the energy powerhouses in eukaryotic cells. One popular hypothesis claims these organelles were a pre-requisite to the transition from simpler prokaryotes like bacteria and archaea to larger, more complex eukaryotic organisms. The new study challenges this assumption. Credit: Jason DreesIn the beginning, there was boredom. Following the emergence of cellular life on...
A 99-million-year-old piece of amber trapped this worker hell ant grasping an ancient relative of modern cockroaches in its unique jaws, which swung upwards unlike all modern ants.The 99-million-yr-old ant had scythe-like jaws that swung upward to pin prey against a horn-like head appendage.Some 99 million years back, an ant, unlike any alive today,...
Belinda Chang (back left) leads a lab that focuses on the evolutionary transition of animals' vision. Sarah Dungan (right of Chang) researched whale vision as a former member of Chang’s lab. Credit: Diana TyszkoCollege of Toronto researchers have clarified the evolutionary transition of whales' early ancestors from on-shore living to deep-sea foraging, recommending that these...
Horticulturalist Carlos Magdalena in Bolivia viewing the largest known giant water lily species (Victoria boliviana). Credit: Cesar David SalazarAn artist's observations, two botanists' suspicions, and DNA tests reveal a case of mistaken identity among giant water plants.When 19th-century European botanists encountered impressive water lilies with leaves more extensive than a pingpong table, they initially...
Credit: durantelallera/ShutterstockA study looks to find the reason for males having more upper-body mass than women. The research is based on the assumption that men have been fighters for so long that evolution has chosen those best equipped for the task. If men combated other men, winners would have survived and reproduced, losers not...
