Evolution

Self-Pollinating Plant Has Loss Of Genetic Variation Without External Pollinators

An experiment found that selfing” monkeyflower plants lost 13 percent to 24 percent of their genetic variation compared to another group that were propagated by bumble bees.  Genetic variation is important to respond to changes in nature or the overall en ...

Article - News Staff - Aug 10 2022 - 7:37am

The Science Of The Midday Siesta- Why Heat Makes Us Sleepy

If you get sleepy in the middle of hot days, you are not alone. You are not even alone in the animal kingdom. Biology may be behind it. We know that many people have a harder time sleeping in the summer and be slow to get out of bed on colder mornings and ...

Article - News Staff - Aug 18 2022 - 1:09pm

Evolution And The Importance Of Hybridization

Although neanderthals died out over 40,000 years ago, we are living in an age in which there are more people with their DNA than at any other time in history, with research finding that ...

Article - Mark Pierce - Sep 7 2022 - 9:04am

200 Million Years Before Giant Whales, Ichthyosaurs Migrated To Give Birth In...Nevada

Giant blue and humpback whales migrate across the ocean to breed and give birth in waters where predators are scarce. A new analysis of the fossil bed in the Berlin-Ichthyosaur State Park (BISP) in Nevada’s Humboldt-Toiyabe National Forest suggests that ne ...

Article - News Staff - Dec 20 2022 - 10:46am

Humans Sleep Longer In The Winter

We have a body clock that changes with exposure to sun and a new study finds that while humans don't hibernate, we do sleep longer in the winter.  ...

Article - News Staff - Feb 17 2023 - 9:29am

DAN5/P1: Homo Erectus Early Cranial Capacity Was More Like Australopiths Such As 'Lucy'

An analysis of the 1.5 million-year-old cranium DAN5/P1, found at the Gona site in Ethiopia, has cranial cranial morphology which indicates that it belongs to the species Homo erectus but near the earliest African stage, where it is sometimes identified us ...

Article - News Staff - Mar 1 2023 - 5:28pm

How Fish Evolved To Walk – And Then Talk

When you think about human evolution, there’s a good chance you’re imagining chimpanzees exploring ancient forests or early humans daubing woolly mammoths on to cave walls. But we humans, along with bears, lizards, hummingbirds and Tyrannosaurus rex, are ...

Article - The Conversation - Mar 3 2023 - 1:21pm

The Spring In Our Step Isn't Just Happiness, It's How We Run So Well On Two Feet

A phrase like 'spring in your step' is usually meant to evoke enthusiasm or happiness but a new study finds that its mechanism, the spring-like arch in our feet, did help us walk on two feet. Just in a different way than previously believed. Most ...

Article - News Staff - May 30 2023 - 11:13am

Male Masturbation Linked To Greater Ability For Offspring In Primates

If you have been to a zoo and been around our primate evolutionary cousins with kids, you may have had an awkward moment or two. They are going to masturbate, and don't care who's watching. A new study says more is better. The Postcopulatory Sele ...

Article - News Staff - Jun 7 2023 - 2:08pm

Group Selfishness In Our Genes Is Original Sin- Nobel Laureate Christian De Duve

Evolution has no moral compass.  We all know that.  And it has no guiding hand.  For that reason, says  Christian de Duve, professor emeritus at the Catholic University of Louvain and Nobel laureate (Medicine or Physiology 1974), we may be doomed. And to g ...

Article - Hank Campbell - Feb 7 2024 - 10:20am