Acoustic warning signals emitted by tiger moths to deter bats - a behavior previously proven only in the laboratory - actually occur in nature and are used as a defense mechanism, according to new research from Wake Forest University.

Field research of free-flying bats conducted in their natural habitats by biology graduate student Nick Dowdy and colleagues shows that tiger moths produce ultrasonic signals to warn bats they don't taste good. This behavior - called acoustic aposematism - was previously proven in the laboratory by biology professor Bill Conner and Jesse Barber, who earned his doctorate at Wake Forest in 2007.

By the time Michelle Marineau saw her patient, James*, there was little she could do to help him. His big toe had been removed, a complication from years of uncontrolled type 2 diabetes, but the amputation site had stubbornly refused to heal. An infection had eaten away flesh and left tendon and bone exposed, streaks of off-white against the angry, red, weeping wound. Several of his other toes had developed gangrene, turning black and slowly dropping off.

By Vikram Jandhyala&Nitin Baliga, Inside Science - We recently met with a host of biotechnology leaders and were struck by their infatuation with Big Data and machine learning. In fact, upon reflection, it was amazing how often the word "algorithm" came up in the course of our conversations with these accomplished scientists.

Don't get us wrong. The boom in software and computing has achieved powerful and profound results in our society. And, yes, the world is a better place, thanks to data analytics.

Researchers have compiled the first global set of observations of the movement of the Earth's mantle, the 3000-kilometre-thick layer of hot silicate rocks between the crust and the core, and have found that it looks very different to predictions made by geologists over the past 30 years.

WASHINGTON -- Evidence is mounting that the current outbreak of yellow fever is becoming the latest global health emergency, say two Georgetown University professors who call on the World Health Organization to convene an emergency committee under the International Health Regulations. In addition, with frequent emerging epidemics, they call for the creation of a "standing emergency committee" to be prepared for future health emergencies.

Microbiologists at The University of Texas at Austin and their colleagues have cracked the genetic code of how bacteria broke down oil to help clean up the Deepwater Horizon oil spill, revealing that some bacteria have far greater potential for consuming oil than was previously known. The findings, published in the journal Nature Microbiology, have applications for responding to future oil spills and other ecological disasters, while shedding light on the ways in which tiny microbes played an outsized role in limiting damage from the 2010 spill caused by the explosion of a BP oil rig.

With the Large Hadron Collider now finally up and running after the unfortunate weasel incident, physicists at CERN and around the world are eager to put their hands on the new 2016 collisions data. The #MoarCollisions hashtag keeps entertaining the tweeting researchers and their followers, and everybody is anxious to finally ascertain whether the tentative signal of a new 750 GeV particle seen in diphoton decays in last year's data will reappear and confirm an epic discovery, or what.

Human-specific variants of four microRNAs may have altered expression levels and gene targets compared to other great apes, according to a study published April 22, 2016 in the open-access journal PLOS ONE by Alicia Gallego from the Institute of Evolutionary Biology, Spain, and colleagues.

MicroRNAs are post-transcriptional gene regulators known to be involved in almost every biological function. They are highly conserved among species and, while some differences exist, the effect of the variations is often unclear. The authors of the present study analysed over 1500 microRNAs to identify variations between humans and other great ape species, including orangutans, gorillas, bonobos and chimpanzees, and the possible effect of these variations on function.

Honeybees use their wings to cool down their hives when temperatures rise, but new University of Colorado Boulder research shows that this intriguing behavior may be linked to both the rate of heating and the size of a honeybee group.

The findings, which were recently published in the journal Animal Behaviour, indicate that honeybees anticipate and react to rapid temperature increases sooner than they do when the increase is gradual -- but only when the bees are clustered in groups of 10.

"Larger groups of bees seem to be better than individuals or small groups at cuing in on how quickly an environment is changing," said Chelsea Cook, a doctoral researcher in the Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology at CU-Boulder and lead author of the study.

Multiple dispersals of penguins reached Australia after the continent split from Antarctica, including 'giant penguins' that may have lived there after they went extinct elsewhere, according to a study published April 26, 2016 in the open-access journal PLOS ONE by Travis Park from Monash University, Australia, and colleagues.