Gigantic mammal ‘cousin’ discovered
During the Triassic period (252-201 million years ago) mammal-like reptiles called therapsids co-existed with ancestors to dinosaurs, crocodiles, mammals, pterosaurs, turtles, frogs, and lizards....
Plant root hairs form outward due to shank hardening
A group of international researchers has discovered how plant root hair grows straight and long. Many studies of root hair growth have been performed,...
Modeling echidna forelimbs to shed new light on mammal evolution
These days, mammals can use their forelimbs to swim, jump, fly, climb, dig and just about everything in between, but the question of how...
Jumping genes shed light on how advanced life may have emerged
A previously unappreciated interaction in the genome turns out to have possibly been one of the driving forces in the emergence of advanced life,...
Current climate models underestimate warming by black carbon aerosol
Soot belches out of diesel engines, rises from wood- and dung-burning cookstoves and shoots out of oil refinery stacks. According to recent research, air...
Is Antarctica becoming more like Greenland?
Antarctica is high and dry and mostly bitterly cold, and it's easy to think of its ice and snow as locked away in a...
The taming of the dog, cow, horse, pig and rabbit
Research at the Earlham Institute into one of the 'genetic orchestra conductors', microRNAs, sheds light on our selectively guided evolution of domestic pets and...
New ‘smart’ material with potential biomedical, environmental uses
Brown University researchers have shown a way to use graphene oxide (GO) to add some backbone to hydrogel materials made from alginate, a natural...
Exoplanet stepping stones
Astronomers have gleaned some of the best data yet on the composition of a planet known as HR 8799c -- a young giant gas...
Could an anti-global warming atmospheric spraying program really work?
A program to reduce Earth's heat capture by injecting aerosols into the atmosphere from high-altitude aircraft is possible, but unreasonably costly with current technology,...
Scientists find remains of huge ancient herbivore
A giant, plant-eating creature with a beak-like mouth and reptilian features may have roamed the Earth during the late Triassic period more than 200...
