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Cat flea
The Cat flea (Ctenocephalides felis) is one of the most abundant and widespread fleas in the world. The cat flea's primary host is the domestic cat, but this is also the primary flea infesting dogs in most of the world. The cat flea can also maintain its life cycle on other carnivores and on the Virginia opossum. Rabbits, rodents, ruminants and humans can be infested or bitten, but a population of cat fleas cannot be sustained by these aberrant hosts. Cat fleas can transmit other parasites and infections to dogs and cats and also to humans. The most prominent of these are Bartonella, the tapeworm Dipylidium caninum, and murine typhus.
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September 28, 2026
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Sep. 25, 2026 Scientists discovered rare flavoalkaloids in Cannabis leaves for the first time, along with dozens of other phenolic compounds that had never been reported in the plant. The findings suggest that ...
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Sep. 24, 2026 Scientists discovered two tiny new snail species in Montenegro, showing that even Europe still holds animals unknown to science. One lives in the threatened Komarnica Canyon, where a proposed hydropower reservoir could destroy habitat before its ...
Sep. 23, 2026 A broken rib from Scotty, the largest known T. rex skeleton, contains an extraordinary fossilized network of blood vessels formed while the dinosaur was healing. Scientists used neutron and X-ray ...
Sep. 23, 2026 Some tropical trees have evolved a clever way to survive drought by taking in carbon dioxide at night, allowing them to keep their pores closed during the hot daytime and conserve water. By comparing three Clusia species, researchers discovered that ...
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Sep. 19, 2026 A deep-sea microbe uses an exceptionally heat-resistant enzyme to turn atmospheric nitrogen into ammonia at temperatures that would destroy most proteins. Its unusual structure and a newly observed reaction state may reveal an ancient, shared ...
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Sep. 28, 2026 A beautifully preserved fossil from Mongolia’s Gobi Desert has solved a mystery that puzzled paleontologists for nearly 40 years. Tamirkhan balcarceli shows that zhelestids were not early relatives ...
Sep. 25, 2026 Scientists discovered two strange new sea spider species in the Salish Sea, including a hairy-legged, red-eyed species that can groom itself with ...
Sep. 22, 2026 Researchers observed a humpback whale mother staying beside her presumed stillborn calf for hours and possibly days off Australia’s Gold Coast. She maintained eye contact and remained close to the ...
Sep. 20, 2026 Cats may identify one another through a surprisingly durable chemical “calling card” made from 13 unusual fatty acids in their urine. The compounds appear linked to mysterious fat droplets in the ...
Sep. 20, 2026 Chemical clues preserved inside fossilized T. rex teeth reveal that the dinosaur maintained a body temperature of about 97 degrees Fahrenheit, almost identical to humans. The finding provides direct ...
Sep. 19, 2026 A chemical that stops drywood termites from building new exoskeletons killed about 95% of colonies in testing, offering a potentially safer alternative to traditional fumigation. Because termites ...
Sep. 18, 2026 A 150-million-year-old dinosaur fossil from Spain has been identified as the first confirmed Diplodocus ever found outside North America. The giant sauropod measured about 25 meters long and was ...
Sep. 18, 2026 A newly discovered snake from New Guinea has been named after Guns N’ Roses guitarist Slash, who has loved reptiles since childhood. Genetic testing and physical differences confirmed that the ...
Sep. 17, 2026 Scientists discovered a new frog species in the flooded forests of the western Amazon, distinguishing it from nearly identical relatives through DNA and its unique call. Adenomera varcena highlights ...
Sep. 16, 2026 A newly identified 240-million-year-old animal from Tanzania is forcing scientists to rethink the early dinosaur timeline. Dinodontosaurus isiyavamanda belongs to a group previously known only from ...