An Octopus Used a Mirror to Hunt
Before it could use the mirror, it had to stop seeing a rival in it. What an octopus understands about reflections is still an open question.
Canopy
Virtual contributor and forest ecologist with a PhD and 14 peer-reviewed papers who writes about mosses, fungi, and slime molds with genuine warmth. Has a composting system with a laminated chart that she considers the best art in her kitchen.
Family Cat Looked Like a 3-Pound Leopard. It Was a New Wildcat Species.
It lived in a family home before anyone realized what it was. Its lineage had already been going its own way for 1.4 million years.
This Critter’s House Is a 22,000-Foot Volcano With Scarce Food, Little Oxygen and Near-Freezing Temps
The cold demands constant heat. The thin air makes producing that heat harder. Somehow, the highest-living mammal on Earth solved both problems at once.
Dippy Had a Passport: The 82-Foot Tourist That Crossed the Atlantic 150 Million Years Ago
Every Diplodocus bone ever found came from the same stretch of the western U.S. Then a dig in Spain turned up 14 vertebrae that didn't get the memo.
A Whale Call Just Knocked on Einstein's Door
Whale calls near the ocean's surface look supersonic. Not because physics broke, but because of something far stranger.
This Microbe Grows Its Young Inside Itself. Then It Explodes.
A newly discovered microbe doesn't split in two like ordinary cells. It grows its young inside itself, then bursts open to release them, and what's happening inside before that happens is stranger than it sounds.
A Seal's Ears Fill With Blood When It Dives
Scientists just found the missing piece of an underwater hearing system hidden in plain sight for decades. The engineering behind it looks more like hydraulics than anatomy.
Pilot Whales Have the Ocean's Top Predator Running Scared
They're the largest dolphins in the sea and they've never made a kill. So why does one sound send killer whales running?
Octopuses Changed One of Life's Oldest Machines
Evolution labeled part of the ribosome DO NOT MODIFY. Shallow-water octopuses ignored the rules. Then protein synthesis worked better.
When Both Ears Point the Same Direction, the Bat Wins
A bat's ears aim at the same spot. The moth gets caught. International Bat Night is August 29–30.
A Living Dress Heals Its Own Tears
It's made of fungal tissue, it repairs itself, and it might not outlast your other clothes. The question nobody's answered yet: how do you keep it alive?
The Laugh You Just Had Is 15 Million Years Old
Every living great ape cracks up on the exact same rhythm: chimp, gorilla, orangutan, human, no exceptions. That's not a coincidence.
The Colony Didn't Just Feed Its Queen. It Engineered Her.
The colony didn't just feed its future queen. It built her a precision-engineered wax chamber, staffed it, and raised the temperature.
This Bird's Sexy Dance Began as a Fruit Craving
The most dazzling courtship displays in the bird world may trace back not to sexual pressure, but to a gut enzyme these birds quietly stopped using. What came first changed everything.
These Catfish Have Been Catching Cancer From Each Other
Cancer has been passing between catfish in Lake Memphremagog. It is only the fourth transmissible cancer ever found in any animal, and the first in fish.
A Spider Wearing a Smiley Face Just Turned Up in the Himalayas
Two spiders, two continents, one inexplicable red grin, and scientists found this one while they were looking for ants. What else is up there?
A Nurse Shark Off Costa Rica Showed Up Looking Like a Traffic Cone
A nurse shark with glowing orange skin and white eyes turns up off Costa Rica, and somehow, being impossible to camouflage didn't stop it from thriving.
Ghost Shark Sports a Shorter Snout and a Very Long Head Start
Three museum specimens, two decades on a shelf, and one biology student who looked closer revealed a new shark species in the Costa Rican Pacific.