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ScienceDaily: Plants & Animals News |
Study tracks severe bleaching events on a Pacific coral reef over past century Posted: 08 Nov 2018 01:43 PM PST A new study has uncovered the history of bleaching on a reef in the epicenter of El Nino, revealing how some corals have been able to return after facing extreme conditions. |
Anopheles mosquitoes could spread Mayaro virus in US, other diverse regions Posted: 08 Nov 2018 01:43 PM PST Mosquitoes of the genus Anopheles are well known as primary vectors of malaria. But a new study suggests that Anopheles species, including some found in the United States, also are capable of carrying and transmitting an emerging pathogen, Mayaro virus, which has caused outbreaks of disease in South America and the Caribbean. |
Tiny footprints, big discovery: Reptile tracks oldest ever found in Grand Canyon Posted: 08 Nov 2018 11:24 AM PST Geologists have discovered that a set of 28 footprints left behind by a reptile-like creature 310 million years ago are the oldest ever to be found in Grand Canyon National Park. |
Warming waters caused rapid -- and opposite -- shifts in connected marine communities Posted: 08 Nov 2018 11:24 AM PST Two connected marine ecosystems -- the Eastern English Channel and Southern North Sea -- experienced big and opposite changes in their fish communities over a 30-year period. Rapid warming drove smaller ocean fishes to shift abruptly northward from one ecosystem to the other. |
How many calories do you burn? It depends on time of day Posted: 08 Nov 2018 11:24 AM PST Researchers have made the surprising discovery that the number of calories people burn while at rest changes with the time of day. When at rest, people burn 10 percent more calories in the late afternoon and early evening than in the early morning hours. |
Decline in shorebirds linked to climate change, experts warn Posted: 08 Nov 2018 11:24 AM PST Researchers have discovered that daily nest predation of shorebirds has increased threefold over the last 70 years. The data suggest the larger increase in the Arctic relative to the tropics indicates a link to climate change. |
Can't sleep? Fruit flies and energy drinks offer new clues Posted: 08 Nov 2018 11:23 AM PST Like humans, fruit flies are active during the day, sleep at night and have similar sleep characteristics. A study has discovered a new gene and uncovered a mechanism that modulates sleep by controlling the movement of taurine -- a common ingredient found in many energy drinks -- into neuron cells of the fly brain. Taurine also is abundant in the human brain and is consistently elevated in blood and urine of sleep-deprived people. |
Replaying the tape of life: Is it possible? Posted: 08 Nov 2018 11:23 AM PST A new review explores the complexity of evolution's predictability in extraordinary detail. In it, researchers closely examine evidence from a number of empirical studies of evolutionary repeatability and contingency in an effort to fully interrogate ideas about contingency's role in evolution. |
Healing kidneys with nanotechnology Posted: 08 Nov 2018 11:23 AM PST Researchers have developed a new method for treating and preventing acute kidney injury. Their technique involves the use of tiny, self-assembling forms measuring just billionths of a meter in diameter. |
Posted: 08 Nov 2018 11:22 AM PST Using an innovative robotic platform to observe bees' behavior, researchers showed that, following exposure to neonicotinoid pesticides -- the most commonly-used class of pesticides in agriculture -- bees spent less time nursing larvae and were less social that other bees. Additional tests showed that exposure impaired bees ability to warm the nest, and to build insulating wax caps around the colony. |
Self-assembling protein filaments designed and built from scratch Posted: 08 Nov 2018 11:22 AM PST For the first time, scientists have created, from scratch, self-assembling protein filaments built from identical protein subunits that snap together spontaneously to form long, helical, thread-like configurations. Protein filaments are essential components of several structural and moving parts in living cells, as well as many body tissues. Being able to design and build protein filaments could allow for engineering novel materials for nano-electronics or scaffolds for new diagnostic tests. |
Yellowstone streams recovering thanks to wolf reintroduction Posted: 08 Nov 2018 10:41 AM PST In the first study of its kind, scientists show that the return of large terrestrial carnivores can lead to improved stream structure and function. |
Unique study shows how bats maneuver Posted: 08 Nov 2018 10:41 AM PST For the first time, researchers have succeeded in directly measuring the aerodynamics of flying animals as they maneuver in the air. Previously, the upstroke of the wings was considered relatively insignificant compared to the powerful downstroke but, in a new study, biologists have observed that it is on the upstroke of the wings that bats often turn. |
The secret behind coral reef diversity? Time, lots of time Posted: 08 Nov 2018 10:05 AM PST One of the world's premier diving destinations owes its reputation as a hot spot of marine biodiversity to being undisturbed over millions of years, according to ecologists. The researchers conclude that patterns of high diversity may take tens of millions of years to arise, but can be wiped out in a few years by human impacts. |
Orangutans spontaneously bend straight wires into hooks to fish for food Posted: 08 Nov 2018 08:17 AM PST Cognitive biologists and comparative psychologists have just studied hook tool making in a non-human primate species -- the orangutan. To the researchers' surprise the apes spontaneously manufactured hook tools out of straight wire within the very first trial and in a second task unbent curved wire to make a straight tool. |
Pore size alone does not matter when biological nanopores act as sugar chain biosensors Posted: 08 Nov 2018 08:17 AM PST The effectiveness of nanopore biosensors capable of identifying sugar chains from biological molecules involved in key biological processes also depends on the nanopore's electrical charge and inner pore design. |
Species' longevity depends on brain cell numbers Posted: 08 Nov 2018 08:00 AM PST Scientists have thought that the main determinant of maximal longevity in warm-blooded animals -- which varies from as little as 2 to as many as 211 years -- is a species' metabolic rate, which is inversely related to body size. It follows that at 2 years of life, small animals with high metabolic rates are already old, but large animals with low metabolic rates are still young. |
Biomimetics: The chemical tricks of our blood Posted: 08 Nov 2018 06:13 AM PST Biomolecules such as hemoglobin or chlorophyll are difficult to study. It is worth investigating similar but simpler structures in the lab. Unexpected behavior has now been found in phthalocyanines, whose molecular ring structure closely resembles the crucial sections of hemoglobin or chlorophyll. Their center can be switched into different states with the help of green light, which affects their chemical behavior. |
Florida monarch butterfly populations have dropped 80 percent since 2005 Posted: 08 Nov 2018 06:12 AM PST A 37-year survey of monarch populations in North Central Florida shows that caterpillars and butterflies have been declining since 1985 and have dropped by 80 percent since 2005. |
Posted: 08 Nov 2018 06:12 AM PST People who drink sugary beverages are more likely to eat fast food and confectionery and less likely to make healthy dietary choices, new research has found. |
Cell behavior, once shrouded in mystery, is revealed in new light Posted: 08 Nov 2018 06:12 AM PST Previously, in order to study cell membranes, researchers would often have to freeze samples. The proteins within these samples would not behave like they would in a normal biological environment. Now, using an atomic force microscope, researchers can observe individual proteins in an unfrozen sample -- acting in a normal biological environment. This new observation tool could help scientists better predict how cells will behave when new components are introduced. |
Biodiversity draws the ecotourism crowd Posted: 08 Nov 2018 06:12 AM PST Nature -- if you support it, ecotourists will come. Managed wisely, both can win. The balancing act of protecting and fostering biodiversity with hordes of tourists in pristine nature parks is a global challenge. There are pathways to having it all -- protected areas with a rich variety of animals and plants and thriving tourism. In fact, the better the biodiversity, the more tourists will visit. What it takes to balance it is careful, holistic conservation strategy. |
Exhaustive analysis reveals cell division's inner timing mechanisms Posted: 07 Nov 2018 02:29 PM PST After exploring every possible correlation, researchers shed new light on a long-standing question about what triggers cell division. |
Study shows how vultures evesdrop to gather vital flight information Posted: 07 Nov 2018 10:03 AM PST A new study has shown vultures use their very own social networks to take advantage of thermal updrafts which help them fly vast distances. Researchers examined how the vultures seemed to make risky but efficient choices when it came to their flight patterns by observing other birds in the network. |
Microbiome implicated in sea star wasting disease Posted: 07 Nov 2018 10:02 AM PST A first-of-its-kind study shows that the sea star microbiome is critically important to the progression of the wasting disease that is killing these animals from Mexico to Alaska -- and that an imbalance of microbes might be the culprit. |
Disrupting communication in infectious bacteria Posted: 07 Nov 2018 10:02 AM PST Chemists report that they have inhibited the biosynthesis of a bacterial signal and, as a result, blocked the infectious properties of Pseudomonas aeruginosa, the most common germ found in health care facilities. |
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