Life
- Animals
To tell a right-trunked elephant from a lefty, check the wrinkles
Elephant trunks, more sci-fi face-tentacle than ho-hum mammal nose, are getting new scrutiny as researchers explore how the wrinkles grow.
- Neuroscience
Semaglutide saps mice’s motivation to run
Mice given semaglutide, the key ingredient in drugs like Ozempic and Wegovy, lost weight, but they also voluntarily ran less on a wheel.
- Animals
These sea creatures can fuse their bodies
A species of comb jelly can fuse its body with another jelly after injury. Some of the pair’s body functions then synchronize.
- Genetics
The discovery of microRNA wins the 2024 physiology Nobel Prize
Victor Ambros and Gary Ruvkun found a new principle of gene regulation essential for all multicellular organisms.
- Animals
Some tadpoles don’t poop for weeks. That keeps their pools clean
Eiffinger’s tree frog babies store their solid waste in an intestinal pouch, releasing less ammonia into their watery cribs than other frog species.
- Health & Medicine
An mRNA vaccine protected mice against deadly intestinal C. difficile bacteria
An mRNA vaccine that targets several aspects of C. difficile’s ability to cause severe disease prevented major symptoms and death in mice.
- Neuroscience
Scientists have traced all 54.5 million connections in a fruit fly’s brain
By tracing every single connection between nerve cells in a single fruit fly’s brain, scientists have created the “connectome,” a tool that could help reveal how brains work.
- Animals
Dolphins’ open-mouth behaviors during play are like smiles, a study claims
Experts urge caution in calling bottlenosed dolphins’ gesture a humanlike “smile,” but agree it seems to be important for how the animals communicate.
- Animals
Coyotes have the face muscles for that ‘sad-puppy’ look
The ability to make heart-melting stares may not be the fruit of dog domestication if their still-wild cousins have the power to do it too.
- Life
The fruit fly revolutionized biology. Now it’s boosting science in Africa
African researchers are using Drosophila melanogaster fruit flies to advance studies of genetics, biomedicine, developmental biology, toxicology and more.
- Animals
Bird nests made with a toxic fungus seem to fend off attacking ants
Two species of birds in Costa Rica build nests in trees defended by ants. Ants that encounter the horsehair fungus in the nests develop odd behaviors.
- Animals
‘Night Magic’ invites you to celebrate the living wonders of the dark
In the book ‘Night Magic,’ Leigh Ann Henion writes of encounters with salamanders, bats, glowworms and other life-forms nurtured by darkness.
