Some of Africa's oldest and biggest baobab trees—a few dating all the way back to the ancient Greeks—have abruptly died, wholly or in part, in the past decade, researchers said Monday.
The trees, aged between 1,100 and 2,500 years and...
While humans and other species share some of the same genetic information, new research found that humans are unique among mammals when it comes to the types and diversity of microorganisms on our skin. This difference could have implications...
Nestled deep in each of your cells is what seems like a magic trick: Six feet of DNA is packaged into a tiny space 50 times smaller than the width of a human hair. Like a long, thin string...
An international team of researchers has made CRISPR technology more accessible and standardized by simplifying its complex implementation. The simpler, faster CRISPR, which is presented in the journal Nature Communications, offers a broad platform for off-the shelf genome engineering...
Photosynthesis is how plants 'make their food' and feed the rest of the planet. The key ingredient in that recipe is carbon. So, the process captures energy from the sun, which is then used to tear away carbon from...
Disgust has long been recognised as an emotion which evolved to help our ancestors avoid infection, but now researchers have been able to show the human disgust system is likely to be structured around the people, practices and objects...
The evolution of larger brains in the last 3 million years played an important role in our ability as a species to think, problem-solve, and develop culture. But the genetic changes behind the expansion that made us human have...
Compared with many animals, human eyes aren't particularly adept at distinguishing colors or seeing in dim light. But by one measure at least—something called visual acuity—human eyes can see fine details that most animals can't, Duke University researchers say.
A...
Starting about 7,000 years ago, something weird seems to have happened to men: Over the next two millennia, recent studies suggest, their genetic diversity —specifically, the diversity of their Y chromosomes—collapsed. So extreme was that collapse that it was...
A hand-made super-microscope—capable of seeing the actual building blocks of a bacterial cell wall—has helped Monash researchers decipher how bacteria are able to literally build a wall against the immune system, leading to often deadly disease.
One of the keys...
The benefits of antibiotics to both human and animal health are undisputed. However, as microbes have become increasingly resistant to antimicrobials and other drugs, scientists have become interested in new solutions to the growing superbug crisis, including the use...
