Biological Fields

Cousins are indeed complicated. Who's your first cousin once removed? And what are kissing cousins? We'll tell you in our cousins tutorial.

By Jesslyn Shields

Scientists at the Natural History Museum in London described 552 species in 2021, including a couple of dinosaurs.

By Jesslyn Shields

They might look like piles of goop, but slime molds can think and seemingly make decisions without a brain.

By Jesslyn Shields

One of the weirdest organisms on Earth has a predictably quirky method of deciding where to go and what to do.

By Jesslyn Shields

Nitrogen is essential to living things, but it also plays hard to get.

By Jesslyn Shields

Cute little balls of moss, called glacier mice, have been known to move up to an inch a day, all at the same time, like a herd of mice, but how and why?

By Katie Carman

Commensalism is a form of cooperation among species in which one species benefits from another without the first one suffering any harm from the relationship.

By Jesslyn Shields

How do we consider a Thing with no edge? Ecosystem ecologists are always trying.

By Jesslyn Shields

Amanita phalloides is non-native to the North American continent, introduced to California from Europe, and rapidly spreading.

By Tara Yarlagadda

Surprisingly, sheep semen stored for 50 years produced perfectly healthy lambs.

By Jesslyn Shields

Horseshoe crabs have blue blood that can detect toxins, a rare ability that's threatening their survival.

By Loraine Fick

For years, speculation has surrounded the government's high security animal disease research center, which is slated to close in 2023.

By Patrick J. Kiger

Bezoars are concretions found in the stomachs of animals that were once believed to cure poisoning and plague.

By Loraine Fick

A strange, but surprisingly accurate, ancient Egyptian pregnancy test survived for millennia and was spread around Africa and Europe because it was just that effective.

By Jesslyn Shields

Researchers say that Otzi, the ancient man found in the Alps in 1991, lived on a diet loaded with fat to maintain warmth and energy in his cold, high-altitude environment.

By Patrick J. Kiger

An ecological periodic table could help scientists predict what will happen as climate change forces ecosystems to evolve. But is such a thing possible?

By Jesslyn Shields

A woman has given birth to the first baby born in the U.S. from a transplanted uterus. The product is no doubt rewarding, but the process isn't easy.

By Jesslyn Shields

On the surface, Antarctica may seem like a barren landscape. But underneath, in massive ice caves, life may be abundant.

By Amanda Onion

What are the chances there are still large, undiscovered animals on the planet? More likely than you might think.

By Diana Brown

Donating your body to science is definitely one way to get into med school, right?

By Kate Kershner

There are many myths and stigmas associated with leprosy, almost all completely incorrect. It's not a very contagious disease, and it's easily treatable. What else is wrong in the common beliefs about Hansen's disease?

By Maria Trimarchi

There's a great need for people to donate their bodies to science but not many people think about doing it. What happens to your body after you make that decision?

By Melanie Radzicki McManus

Jack Black does it. Wyclef Jean does it. And chances are, you do it, too. Everyone's a rock star in the bathroom. And there's a scientific explanation behind our soapy musical stylings.

By Debra Ronca

From tobacco smoke enemas to whirling chairs, doctors have tried almost everything to cure human disease.

By Maria Trimarchi

A funny thing happens when you live in complete darkness. You lose your eyesight. At least that's what's happened to the species that have evolved inside our deepest, darkest caves.

By Debra Ronca