Biology

Newly discovered species of frog has been hiding in NYC for years

One of the most exciting things about genetic research is how much it has taught us about the diversity of life on Earth. Case in point: the as-yet-unnamed frog species pictured here. It looks so much like New York City’s other leopard frogs that scientists overlooked it for years, but by examining its DNA, researchers…

io9 Robbie Gonzalez

Meet the “hot defensive bee ball,” one of the craziest tactics in the animal kingdom

Japanese honey bees have a unique defensive trait against the enormous — and sting-proof — giant hornet. They form a ‘‘hot defensive bee ball”, enveloping and overheating the insect, and now a Japanese research team has looked into what happens in their brains when they do so. That defensive bee ball is probably the strangest…

io9 Tim Barribeau

Scientific Proof That Women Hate Beards

Every man grows a beard at some point in his life. But that’s not to say that it’s a good idea. In fact, science now confirms that while a beard makes you look older and of higher status, it makes you less attractive to women. The research, conducted by Barnaby Dixson and Paul Vasey from…

Tech News Jamie Condliffe

Most violent fossil ever shows the final record of a three-way hunt

150 million years ago, a flying reptile saw a fish in the waters of the Jurassic Ocean. The reptile caught its prey…and then was almost immediately grabbed by a much larger fish. That’s when things really started to go wrong. It’s rare to see a fossil that records the final moments of two different creatures,…

io9 Alasdair Wilkins

Scientists may have just discovered a brand new species of human

This skull has a weird mix of ancient and modern traits. It was discovered in a cave in southwest China and dates to between 14,500 and 11,500 years ago. And it might represent the newest humanoid species to coexist with humans. First, there were the Neanderthals, which were first discovered in Germany 150 years ago…

io9 Alasdair Wilkins

When rats are as smart as humans

In a battle of wits, humans and rats are way more evenly matched than you’d think. While we obviously have an advantage in overall intelligence, our ability to read situations and make decisions is actually no better than a rat’s. In what has got to be great news for anyone who has ever tried and…

io9 Alasdair Wilkins

Researchers have created electricity generating “cyborg snails”

In The Matrix, the Machines farm humans for energy. Today, we do the exact same thing with tiny critters like cockroaches. Who would ever need such a tiny power source? The US Department of Defense. For years, the DOD has been looking for ways to equip small animals like insects and mollusks with battery-powered microcircuits…

io9 Robbie Gonzalez

Earth’s simplest organisms are part of the food chain after all

Archaea are some of the most abundant and least understood, organisms on the planet. These single-celled creatures weren’t even properly discovered until the 1970s, and big questions about them remain unanswered, such as whether other organisms ever eat them. That might seem like the sort of thing we can take for granted – of course…

io9 Alasdair Wilkins

Promiscuity promotes a healthier society

While debates rage among humans over the value of promiscuity, the argument is settled among honey bees. New evidence from several scientific studies suggests that queen bees who mate with multiple males are able to build healthier hives that are more productive, well-fed, and disease-resistant than hives where the queen mated only once. Every summer,…

io9 Annalee Newitz

Why dolphins, cats, and other carnivores can’t taste sweets

Most mammals — humans included — have taste receptors that can detect sweet, salty, sour, bitter and savory flavors; but the bottlenose dolphin pictured above has lost its ability to detect sugars. In fact, newly published research reveals that the dolphin is just one of many carnivores that has lost its ability to sense sweetness…

io9 Robbie Gonzalez

The last time we redefined what it means to be human

Over the past decade, you may have noticed more and more articles referring to “hominins” rather than “hominids.” Just why are Homo sapiens and her ancestors now called hominins? The answer isn’t just semantic — it has to do with a revolution in the way evolutionary biologists perceive humans’ place in the tree of life.…

io9 Annalee Newitz

Insects have been battling each other across continents for millions of years

Many insect species have natural enemies. Often, insects are locked in an evolutionary race for dominance with another insect species — and it turns out that these wars are much more epic than we ever realized, according to a new analysis of insect DNA. Researchers at the University of Edinburgh used the DNA of a…

io9 Alasdair Wilkins

Eating Vegetables Makes Your Skin More Attractive

If your mother always used to nag you to eat your greens, good on her! New research suggests that not only are vegetables good for you, they also make your skin more attractive to the opposite sex. The research, carried out at the University of St. Andrews in Scotland, studied the effects of fruit and…

Health Jamie Condliffe

An extra female sex chromosome might actually make guys more masculine

Between 1 in 500 and 1 in 1000 men have an extra X chromosome, a condition known as Klinefelter’s Syndrome. In mice, these extra female genes have an unexpected effect, as the second X chromosome actually makes mice more masculine. When researchers talk about “masculine” and “feminine” behaviors, they’re typically talking about an animal’s sexual…

io9 Alasdair Wilkins

Smoking ban linked to major drop in pregnancy complications

Scotland was the first country in the UK to implement a public place smoking ban, back in March of 2006. Now researchers have gone back and looked at a number of birth complications, and seen them drop precipitously since the legislation came into effect. Specifically, the researchers were tracking preterm and underweight births from January…

io9 Tim Barribeau

The Stroop Effect reveals that you believe what you read, even if you know it’s false

We think that the ability to read is a complicated, artificial process, but when’s the last time you’ve seen a sign, in your native language, that you’ve chosen not to read? The Stroop Test shows how deep the ability to read runs through us. There is no instinctual ability to read. Written words are shapes…

io9 Esther Inglis-Arkell

Bees have personalities — and we can change them

Honey bees drones actually have a large spectrum of personalities. Scientists found that some are homebodies, some are explorers, and no matter what they are, we can change them. There are some scientific studies for which the results don’t matter so much as the method of inquiry. For example, when people hear that a team…

io9 Esther Inglis-Arkell

10 Weapons That Animals Use

We’ve come a long way from thinking that what separates us from the animals is, say, using a rock to bash in the skull of our competitors. It turns out that there are a lot of creatures out that that re-purpose tools to make their personal world better and someone else’s world a lot worse.…

io9 Esther Inglis-Arkell

How to copy biological growth, and transform 2D gels into 3D shapes

Biological organisms have a nifty trick, where they can grow uniform materials into three dimensional shapes by limiting growth in certain areas. As some cells expand, others don’t, causing the object to warp in three dimensions. Now researchers have applied that same theory to gel sheets, and developed a way of transforming them between flat…

io9 Tim Barribeau

Nature Photos That Will Rock Your World

If you’re in Washington DC soon, you might be in for a major treat — the winners of the 2011 Windland Smith Rice Awards for nature photography are going to be on display at the Smithsonian. And judging from what we’ve seen, these are some of the most vibrant, exciting nature photos that have come…

io9 Charlie Jane Anders

Newly discovered species of frog has been hiding in NYC for years

Meet the “hot defensive bee ball,” one of the craziest tactics in the animal kingdom

Scientific Proof That Women Hate Beards

Most violent fossil ever shows the final record of a three-way hunt

Scientists may have just discovered a brand new species of human

When rats are as smart as humans

Researchers have created electricity generating “cyborg snails”

Earth’s simplest organisms are part of the food chain after all

Promiscuity promotes a healthier society

Why dolphins, cats, and other carnivores can’t taste sweets

The last time we redefined what it means to be human

Insects have been battling each other across continents for millions of years

Eating Vegetables Makes Your Skin More Attractive

An extra female sex chromosome might actually make guys more masculine

Smoking ban linked to major drop in pregnancy complications

The Stroop Effect reveals that you believe what you read, even if you know it’s false

Bees have personalities — and we can change them

10 Weapons That Animals Use

How to copy biological growth, and transform 2D gels into 3D shapes

Nature Photos That Will Rock Your World

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