Research Highlight |
Featured
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Book Review |
Is ‘speciesism’ as bad as racism or sexism?
We are all complicit in a global farming industry that puts profit before animal welfare — but establishing what moral principles we should be applying isn’t easy, an update of a classic book shows.
- Jonathan Birch
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Research Highlight |
Glow-worms’ ‘come-hither’ signals are lost in the glare of human lights
Artificial lighting could make some populations of these insects wink out.
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Where I Work |
How I use science to protect my people’s birthright
Jean-Luc Kanapé combines the ancestral knowledge of his Indigenous Canadian community, the Innu, with technology to protect the region’s caribou from predators and environmental damage.
- Patricia Maia Noronha
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News |
Deaths of African cheetahs in India shine spotlight on controversial conservation project
Scientists fear that an Indian park is not enough space for the planned population — and that not enough work has been done with locals on how they will respond to the animals.
- Gayathri Vaidyanathan
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Research Briefing |
A battle between neural circuits for infanticide and maternal-care behaviours
A previously unknown neural circuit in the brains of female mice is activated during infanticidal behaviour, and reciprocally inhibits another circuit that promotes maternal-care behaviour. These circuits show opposing changes in excitability when female mice become mothers, explaining the switch in young-directed behaviours that occurs with motherhood.
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Nature Podcast |
A brain circuit for infanticide, in mice
Research reveals system underlying behaviour change towards young, and identifying the source of fast solar wind.
- Noah Baker
- & Nick Petrić Howe
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News |
Biggest ever study of primate genomes has surprises for humanity
Genomes of humans’ closest relatives provide insight for conservation, human disease and the origins of social structures.
- Dyani Lewis
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Research Highlight |
These hardy ants build their own landmarks in the desert
Ants living on the sprawling salt pans of Tunisia use DIY markers to find their way home.
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News & Views |
From the archive: aggressive anemones, and Louis Pasteur’s birthday
Snippets from Nature’s past.
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News |
Does the roar of rocket launches harm wildlife? These scientists seek answers
With rocket lift-offs set to increase drastically, a team will monitor the effects of noise pollution at a California spaceport.
- Nicola Jones
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Research Highlight |
How can mosquitoes find you? All you have to do is exhale
Free-flying mosquitoes gravitate toward pads that emit carbon dioxide, which is found in human breath.
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News & Views |
From the archive: a history of climate, and the scent of sitting pheasants
Snippets from Nature’s past.
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News |
Hammerhead sharks are first fish found to ‘hold their breath’
It pays to be an warm hunter in the cold ocean depths, so the animals shut down oxygen intake to conserve heat.
- Bianca Nogrady
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Research Highlight |
Your favourite soap might turn you into a mosquito magnet
Mosquitoes tend to prefer the scent of Dawn and Dial over the odour of an unwashed person.
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News & Views |
From the archive: sunshine statistics, and the hues and habits of aquarium fish
Snippets from Nature’s past.
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Research Highlight |
What drives a scavenger’s diet? Vulture culture
Griffon vultures in northern Spain fill up at landfills, but their southern brethren prefer the carcasses of wild animals.
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Nature Careers Podcast |
How trauma’s effects can pass from generation to generation
Neuroepigenetics researcher Isabelle Mansuy investigates how life life experiences and environmental factors can shape not only us, but also our descendants.
- Dom Byrne
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News & Views |
An evolutionary route to warning coloration
Bright colours that signal toxicity can deter predators, but how such colours initially evolve without first endangering conspicuous organisms is a contentious issue. Analysis of amphibians offers an answer to the puzzle.
- Tim Caro
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News |
Drugs give biology’s favourite worms the munchies too
Experiments with C. elegans suggest that the mechanism by which cannabis affects appetite evolved 500 million years ago.
- Elissa Welle
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News |
Comb jellies’ unique fused neurons challenge evolution ideas
Fused neurons suggest ctenophores’ nervous system evolved independently of that in other animals.
- Mariana Lenharo
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Research Highlight |
Better than Chanel: perfumed male bees draw more mates
A daub of floral scent gives male orchid bees a leg-up on fathering offspring.
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Nature Video |
‘Touch-taste’: how the octopus repurposed its nervous system to hunt
Researchers identify the structural basis for octopuses chemo-tactile sense.
- Dan Fox
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Nature Podcast |
Octopuses hunt by ‘tasting’ with their suckers
The receptors that help octopuses sense by touch, plus a round-up of stories from the Nature Briefing.
- Benjamin Thompson
- & Nick Petrić Howe
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News |
How octopuses taste with their arms
Ultra-specialized proteins enable octopuses and squids to taste surfaces with their suckers — and these proteins are tailored to each animal’s way of life.
- Sara Reardon
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News & Views |
From the archive: new words to describe human–machine relationships, and a demonstration of the perceptual abilities of butterflies
Snippets from Nature’s past.
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News |
Crazy ants’ strange genomes are a biological first
Males of the notorious yellow crazy ant carry a mixture of genomes, a phenomenon unseen in other animals.
- Ewen Callaway
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News & Views |
From the archive: the wonders of life contained in the soil, and the sociability of cats
Snippets from Nature’s past.
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Research Briefing |
Birdsong sequences initiated by a small cluster of cells in the brain
The zebra finch’s courtship song consists of a fixed sequence of vocal elements called syllables. A small structure in the thalamus, deep in the brain, forms connections with a set of nerve cells that become active at the beginning of syllables, thereby initiating components of the finch’s vocal repertoire.
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News Feature |
Bats live with dozens of nasty viruses — can studying them help stop pandemics?
Researchers are examining the weird immune systems of bats, hoping to help prevent the next outbreak.
- Smriti Mallapaty
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News & Views |
From the archive: Saturn, and Charles Darwin shares animal stories
Snippets from Nature’s past.
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Where I Work |
Snub-nosed monkeys have taught me important life lessons
Zoologist Zuofu Xiang’s research in Asia helps governments to protect the populations and teaches him the value of cooperation.
- Andy Tay
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Research Highlight |
Uncovering the secrets of the world’s only frozen fish
Analysis of the the Amur sleeper’s genome and RNA reveal its tricks for surviving the winter frozen in ice.
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Research Highlight |
Watch them waggle: bees dance better after lessons from elders
Well-schooled bees’ performances convey where to find food sources, but uneducated insects’ dances mislead.
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Research Highlight |
These baby mice bawl loudly — and Mum rushes over
Very young deer mice make squeaks audible to the human ear as well as ultrasound calls similar to those made by house mouse pups.
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Article |
Protomelission is an early dasyclad alga and not a Cambrian bryozoan
Protomelission-like macrofossils from the Xiaoshiba Lagerstätte show features characteristic of dasycladalean green alga, suggesting that Protomelission is unlikely to be an early bryozoan.
- Jie Yang
- , Tian Lan
- & Martin R. Smith
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News & Views |
From the archive: ancient mazes, and ants under observation
Snippets from Nature’s past.
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News |
Anxiety can be created by the body, mouse heart study suggests
Artificially raising a mouse’s heart rate leads to anxious behaviour.
- Sara Reardon
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News |
Sex, food or water? How mice decide
Neurons that regulate a mouse’s response to hunger and thirst also influence social interactions with the opposite sex.
- Heidi Ledford
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Research Highlight |
This fish knows its own face in a mirror
The bluestreak cleaner wrasse attacks composite images of its own body and another fish’s head — but not pictures of its own head on another fish’s body.
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News & Views |
From the archive: celebrating Faraday, and an appreciation of parasites
Snippets from Nature’s past.
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Research Highlight |
Fluffball foxes wander thousands of kilometres to find a home
The Arctic fox, which weighs less than many house cats, covers long distances in the frigid north.
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Article |
Exceptional fossil preservation and evolution of the ray-finned fish brain
A well-preserved 319-million-year-old brain of the extinct vertebrate Coccocephalus wildi provides insights into neural anatomy deep within the phylogeny of ray-finned fish.
- Rodrigo T. Figueroa
- , Danielle Goodvin
- & Sam Giles
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Article
| Open AccessAnnelid functional genomics reveal the origins of bilaterian life cycles
Comparative chromosome-scale genome sequencing and transcriptomic and epigenomic profiling of three different species of annelid provide insight into the evolutionary origin of larvae.
- Francisco M. Martín-Zamora
- , Yan Liang
- & José M. Martín-Durán
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Article
| Open AccessTriassic stem caecilian supports dissorophoid origin of living amphibians
Analysis of fossils of the oldest known caecilian provide insights into the origin and morphological and functional evolution of caecilians.
- Ben T. Kligman
- , Bryan M. Gee
- & Michelle R. Stocker
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News |
Transgenic ants shed light on insects’ sense of smell
A fluorescent protein helps to pinpoint parts of the brain that help the animals navigate a world of scents.
- Miryam Naddaf
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News & Views |
From the archive: an economic model named after a goddess, and an ill-fated octopus
Snippets from Nature’s past.
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Research Briefing |
Worms exposed to virulent bacteria show changes in social behaviour
Disease-causing microorganisms can alter the social behaviour of their hosts. Caenorhabditis elegans hermaphrodite worms exposed to an infectious bacterial strain become attracted to a mixture of pheromone cues instead of avoiding it. This boosts mating with males in the hermaphrodites, increasing the ability to produce genetic diversity in the face of microbial challenge.
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News & Views |
From the archive: how kangaroo rats limit their salt intake, and searching for trout
Snippets from Nature’s past.