Tag: Biology
City light pollution is shrinking spiders’ brains
Bright lights at night may alter the brains of nocturnal arachnids, our new study shows. And we’re only just learning what this means for our ecosystems.
We discovered a ‘gentle touch’ molecule is essential for light tactile sensation in humans – and perhaps in individual cells
Our bodies have a dedicated channel for sensing only the very lightest of touches.
A new theory linking evolution and physics has scientists baffled – but is it solving a problem that doesn't exist?
‘Assembly theory’ aims to explain evolution without biology. Is it a dazzling breakthrough or an attempt to answer questions nobody asked?
Two questions, hundreds of scientists, no easy answers: how small differences in data analysis make huge differences in results
246 scientists looked at the same data sets and drew very different conclusions.
Organisms without brains can learn, too – so what does it mean to be a thinking creature?
Box jellyfish have no brains, yet were recently found to be able to learn from touch. Many brainless organisms are now forcing us to rethink what it means to learn.
Ever wonder how your body turns food into fuel? We tracked atoms to find out
Tracing isotopes of carbon inside amino acid molecules has revealed the ‘metabolic fingerprints’ of how different animals store and use energy.
A 'memory wipe' for stem cells may be the key to better therapies
Stem cells could help regenerate diseased or damaged parts of the body – but first, scientists need to make the cells forget their own histories.
Arithmetic has a biological origin – it's an expression in symbols of the 'deep structure' of our perception
Humans have been making symbols for numbers for thousands of years. Different cultures developed their own symbols, but all use addition and multiplication, suggesting arithmetic is a universal truth.
Unique study shows we can train wild predators to hunt alien species they've never seen before
What happens when wild native bush rats meet cockroaches they’ve never seen before?
A 140-year-old Tassie tiger brain sample survived two world wars and made it to our lab. Here's what we found
Brain samples of a thylacine that died in 1880 in Berlin were kept safe by researchers for decades. Now, they have finally been analysed.
