Evolution News
April 26, 2024
Top Headlines
Apr. 23, 2024 Bioluminescence first evolved in animals at least 540 million years ago in a group of marine invertebrates called octocorals, according to the results of a new study. The study focuses on an ancient group of marine invertebrates that includes soft ...
Apr. 24, 2024 Researchers explain the genomic and developmental basis of the patagium, the thin skin membrane that allows some mammalian species to soar through the ...
Apr. 17, 2024 Researchers have shown that an Amazonian butterfly is a hybrid species, formed by two other species breeding together almost 200,000 years ago. Researchers have shown that an Amazonian butterfly is a ...
Apr. 18, 2024 The origin of life continues to remain a matter of debate. The ribonucleic acid (RNA) world hypothesis proposes that 'ribozymes' which store genetic information and possess catalytic functions may ...
Latest Headlines
updated 10:56pm EDT
Apr. 17, 2024 Mountain chickadees have among the best spatial memory in the animal kingdom. New research identifies the genes at play and offers insight into how a shifting climate may impact the evolution of this ...
Apr. 17, 2024 Researchers have identified a variant in the gene TBX1 as key in the development of the unique morphology at the base of the skull. TBX1 is present at higher levels in humans than in closely related ...
Apr. 17, 2024 Competition between species played a major role in the rise and fall of hominins -- and produced a 'bizarre' evolutionary pattern for the Homo ...
Apr. 16, 2024 According to a research team led by palaeontologists, the net-like leaf veining typical for today's flowering plants developed much earlier than ...
Apr. 15, 2024 A series of whole genome and gene duplication events that go back hundreds of millions of years have laid the foundations for tissue-specific gene ...
Apr. 12, 2024 A deep dive into macroalgae genetics has uncovered the genetic underpinnings that enabled macroalgae, or 'seaweed,' to evolve multicellularity. Three lineages of macroalgae developed multicellularity ...
Apr. 11, 2024 Traces of DNA in the stomachs of predatory snails give a team og geobiologists new insights into the ecology of ...
Apr. 10, 2024 Early jawless fish were likely to have used bony projections surrounding their mouths to modify the mouth's shape while they collected food. Experts ...
Apr. 10, 2024 As the centennial of the Scopes Monkey Trial of 1925 approaches, a new study illustrates that the attitudes of Americans in Generation X toward evolution shifted as they ...
Apr. 9, 2024 The first birdfeeders were made in the 19th century, and their design rapidly evolved during the 20th century. Researchers at the consider the evolution of the birdfeeder to be an example of ...
Earlier Headlines
Apr. 8, 2024 Genetic analysis finds evidence suggesting that acoustic fat bodies in the heads of toothed whales were once the muscles and bone marrow of the ...
Apr. 5, 2024 A new reconstruction of the 375-million-year-old fossil fish Tiktaalik -- a close relative of limbed vertebrates -- used micro-CT to reveal bones still embedded in matrix. The reconstruction shows ...
Apr. 5, 2024 A new study calls into question Bergmann's rule, an 1800s-era scientific principle stating that animals in high-latitude, cooler climates tend to be larger than close relatives living in warmer ...
Apr. 3, 2024 Genomic anamolies dating back to the time of the dinosaurs misled scientists about the evolutionary history of ...
Mar. 25, 2024 A new study combining genetic, palaeoecological, and archaeological evidence has unveiled the Persian Plateau as a pivotal geographic location serving as a hub for Homo sapiens during the early ...
Mar. 22, 2024 How was complex life able to develop on the inhospitable early Earth? At the beginning there must have been ribonucleic acid (RNA) to carry the first genetic information. To build up complexity in ...
Mar. 21, 2024 Scientists have explored the puzzling world of rays that lived 150 million years ago and discovered a previously hidden diversity -- including a new ray species. This study significantly expands the ...
Mar. 20, 2024 Researchers have uncovered intriguing details about the origins and spread of the bottle gourd, one of the oldest domesticated crops. Their work unveils the genetic diversification and population ...
Mar. 18, 2024 Dinosaurs get all the glory. But aetosaurs, a heavily armored cousin of modern crocodiles, ruled the world before dinosaurs did. These tanks of the Triassic came in a variety of shapes and sizes ...
Mar. 12, 2024 Giraffes, with their bizarre body plan, have always held a special place in the minds of evolutionary biologists and non-experts alike. In a new study whole-genome sequencing data was used to ...
Mar. 8, 2024 Researchers have discovered a mechanism steering the evolution of multicellular life. They identified how altered protein folding drives multicellular ...
Mar. 4, 2024 Scientists provide fresh insights on the origins of life, presenting compelling evidence supporting the 'RNA World' hypothesis. The study unveils an RNA enzyme that can make accurate copies ...
Mar. 4, 2024 Plant biologists have uncovered an evolutionary mystery over 100 million years in the making. It turns out that sometime during the last 125 million years, tomatoes and Arabidopsis thaliana plants ...
Feb. 28, 2024 A genetic change in our ancient ancestors may partly explain why humans don't have tails like ...
Feb. 22, 2024 The evolutionary success of the first large predators on land was driven by their need to improve as killers, researchers ...
Feb. 22, 2024 More than 100 million years ago, the ancestors of the first snakes were small lizards that lived alongside other small, nondescript lizards in the shadow of the ...
Feb. 21, 2024 Comparison of over 200 high-quality butterfly and moth genomes reveals key insights into their biology, evolution and diversification over the last 250 million years, as well as clues for ...
Feb. 21, 2024 The sea lamprey, a 500-million-year-old animal with a sharp-toothed suction cup for a mouth, is the thing of nightmares. A new study discovered that the hindbrain -- the part of the brain controlling ...
Feb. 15, 2024 Researchers report that ancient viruses may be to thank for myelin -- and, by extension, our large, complex brains. The team found that a retrovirus-derived genetic element or ...
Feb. 14, 2024 A new study explores the weight great fossil sites have on our understanding of evolutionary relationships between fossil groups and quantified the power these sites have on our understanding of ...
Monday, April 8, 2024
Friday, April 5, 2024
- In the Evolution of Walking, the Hip Bone Connected to the Rib Bones
- Dinosaur Study Challenges Bergmann's Rule
Wednesday, April 3, 2024
Monday, March 25, 2024
Friday, March 22, 2024
Thursday, March 21, 2024
Wednesday, March 20, 2024
Monday, March 18, 2024
Tuesday, March 12, 2024
Friday, March 8, 2024
Monday, March 4, 2024
- Modeling the Origins of Life: New Evidence for an 'RNA World'
- An Evolutionary Mystery 125 Million Years in the Making
Wednesday, February 28, 2024
Thursday, February 22, 2024
- Killer Instinct Drove Evolution of Mammals' Predatory Ancestors
- Snakes Do It Faster, Better: How a Group of Scaly, Legless Lizards Hit the Evolutionary Jackpot
Wednesday, February 21, 2024
- Butterfly and Moth Genomes Mostly Unchanged Despite 250 Million Years of Evolution
- An Awkward Family Reunion: Sea Monsters Are Our Cousins
Thursday, February 15, 2024
Wednesday, February 14, 2024
Monday, February 12, 2024
Friday, February 9, 2024
Wednesday, February 7, 2024
- Dinosaurs' Success Helped by Specialized Stance and Gait, Study Finds
- Innovation in Stone Tool Technology Involved Multiple Stages at the Time of Modern Human Dispersals
Monday, February 5, 2024
Friday, February 2, 2024
Tuesday, January 30, 2024
Monday, January 29, 2024
Wednesday, January 24, 2024
- DNA from Preserved Feces Reveals Ancient Japanese Gut Environment
- Ancient Brown Bear Genomes Sheds Light on Ice Age Losses and Survival
Tuesday, January 23, 2024
Thursday, January 18, 2024
- A Window Into Plant Evolution: The Unusual Genetic Journey of Lycophytes
- How Does One Species Become Many?
- Why Animals Shrink Over Time Explained With New Evolution Theory
Tuesday, January 16, 2024
- Pacific Kelp Forests Are Far Older That We Thought
- Feeding Mode of Ancient Vertebrate Tested for First Time
Friday, January 12, 2024
Thursday, January 11, 2024
- Even the Oldest Eukaryote Fossils Show Dazzling Diversity and Complexity
- Oldest Known Fossilized Skin Is 21 Million Years Older Than Previous Examples
Wednesday, January 10, 2024
- Study on Lamprey Embryos Sheds Light on the Evolutionary Origin of Vertebrate Head
- New Research Sheds Light on an Old Fossil Solving an Evolutionary Mystery
Tuesday, January 9, 2024
Monday, January 8, 2024
- How Did the Bushpig Cross the Strait? A Great Puzzle in African Mammal Biogeography Solved by Genomics
- Evolution Is Not as Random as Previously Thought
Friday, January 5, 2024
Thursday, January 4, 2024
Wednesday, January 3, 2024
Thursday, December 14, 2023
Wednesday, December 13, 2023
Thursday, December 7, 2023
- Molecular Fossils Shed Light on Ancient Life
- Geoscientists Map Changes in Atmospheric Carbon Dioxide Over Past 66 Million Years
Monday, December 4, 2023
- Earliest-Known Fossil Mosquito Suggests Males Were Bloodsuckers Too
- Crocodile Family Tree Mapped: New Light Shed on Croc Evolution
Thursday, November 30, 2023
Wednesday, November 29, 2023
Tuesday, November 28, 2023
Thursday, November 23, 2023
Wednesday, November 15, 2023
Monday, November 13, 2023
Thursday, November 9, 2023
- Bacteria-Virus Arms Race Provides Rare Window Into Rapid and Complex Evolution
- New Research Exposes Early Humans' Ecological Versatility
Wednesday, November 8, 2023
Monday, November 6, 2023
- 450-Million-Year-Old Organism Finds New Life in Softbotics
- Fossils Tell Tale of Last Primate to Inhabit North America Before Humans
Thursday, November 2, 2023
Wednesday, November 1, 2023
- Giant Dinosaur Carcasses Might Have Been Important Food Sources for Jurassic Predators
- Where Is a Sea Star's Head? Maybe Just About Everywhere
- How the Fish Got Its Shoulder
Monday, October 30, 2023
Friday, October 27, 2023
- Evolutionary Chance Made This Bat a Specialist Hunter
- Genetic Methods Enable the Use of Fossil Lipids as Biomarkers for Oxygen-Producing Primordial Bacteria
Thursday, October 26, 2023
Wednesday, October 18, 2023
- Ancient Diamonds Shine Light on the Evolution of Earth
- The Encounter Between Neanderthals and Sapiens as Told by Their Genomes
Monday, October 16, 2023
- Scientists, Philosophers Identify Nature's Missing Evolutionary Law
- Extinct Ape Gets a Facelift, 12 Million Years Later
Tuesday, October 10, 2023
Monday, October 9, 2023
Friday, October 6, 2023
Thursday, October 5, 2023
- The End of Genes: Routine Test Reveals Unique Divergence in Genetic Code
- Survival of the Newest: The Mammals That Survive Mass Extinctions Aren't as 'boring' As Scientists Thought
Wednesday, October 4, 2023
Friday, September 29, 2023
- Genome Study Reveals 30 Years of Darwin's Finch Evolution
- Insights Into Early Snake Evolution Through Brain Analysis
- Did Animal Evolution Begin With a Predatory Lifestyle?
Thursday, September 28, 2023
Friday, September 22, 2023
Thursday, September 21, 2023
- Researchers' Analysis of Perching Birds Points to New Answers in Evolutionary Diversification
- Dinosaur Feathers Reveal Traces of Ancient Proteins
Wednesday, September 20, 2023
- Slow Growth in Crocodile Ancestors Pre-Dated Their Semi-Aquatic Lifestyle
- Prehistoric Fish Fills 100 Million Year Gap in Evolution of the Skull
Tuesday, September 19, 2023
- Tiny Sea Creatures Reveal the Ancient Origins of Neurons
- RNA for the First Time Recovered from an Extinct Species
Tuesday, September 12, 2023
Monday, September 11, 2023
Thursday, September 7, 2023
Tuesday, September 5, 2023
- Human Shoulders and Elbows First Evolved as Brakes for Climbing Apes
- Pioneering Research Sheds Surprising New Light on Evolution of Plant Kingdom