Science News
A powerful tail, four legs, membranes between the fingers and hooves. This is the whale rebuilt by a team of paleontologists from a well preserved fossil found in Peru. The question is why four legs? The results, published in Current Biology, lead us to think that the body of this marine mammal, four meters long, adapted to its survival on …
There are many animals and plants that have developed very advanced structures and skills that have served as inspiration for innovations in the design of architectural structures. Termites are an example. Their nests have been studied as effective examples for ventilation and thermoregulation, but aspects remain to be clarified. New research, published by Science Advances, has combined multiscale X-ray …
The new local census of wild tigers in India, published this week, cannot be more encouraging. Its population today is 30% higher than just four years ago. Even so, human activity is about to kill the biggest cat in the world, capable of reaching 300 kilograms. There are only a few thousand left in the …
Chocolate or brown labrador dogs tend to have more health problems and less life expectancy than other specimens of the same breed but of different color. And this may be due to genetic causes, as can be deduced from the results of a study conducted by the Royal Veterinary College in London. Labrador dogs usually live an average …
Water management promoted by local, national and European administrations could be giving its first results in underwater grasslands in Europe, according to a study involving CSIC, published in the journal Nature Communications. The study attributes the recovery to management actions to improve water quality, but also highlights that a third of these ecosystems have disappeared due to …
Sea turtles have been swimming in the oceans for more than a hundred million years, but of the seven species that exist, six are threatened and three of them critically. One of the causes is emerging diseases, the effect of which is increased by globalization, the dispersion of invasive pathogen-bearing species, and by climate change. An international …
The blue jay is one of the loudest and most colorful birds that exist, but its cunning as a predator is enviable. Not only does it feed on almost everything in its path, but it is quick and skillful, as the biologist at the University of Cincinnati George Uetz has proven. It has long been proven …
In a New Zealand forest, the trunk of a tree, with the naked eye, remains alive by clinging to the roots of neighboring trees, exchanging water and resources through the grafted root system. That is the conclusion of a study published in iScience, which details how the surrounding trees keep the trunk alive, possibly in exchange for access …
The birth of a Malay tapir at Chester Zoo in the United Kingdom has become an event. This mammal is the only tapir that does not live in the Americas and is in danger of extinction. The young arrived in the world last Thursday, July 18, with only 5 kilos, after a 13 month pregnancy. Sarah Roffe, director of …
According to a new study, published in Science Advances, by pumping ocean water to the coastal regions surrounding the Antarctic ice sheet and turning it into snow, it is possible to prevent the ice sheet from sliding into the ocean and it melts. The authors warn that, although the findings offer a potentially viable and less dangerous …
