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Evolution & Behaviour

showing 66-70 of 160 breaks

The Rat's Euler Whiskers

In 1970, Thomas Woolsey, a young neuroscientist, was peering through a microscope at thin slices of mouse brain, when he observed something quite remarkable. In a region of the brain called the cerebral cortex, which plays a key role in sensing, memory and emotion in... click to read more

  • V.G.A. Goss | Associate Professor at School of Engineering, London South Bank University, London, UK
  • E.L. Starostin | Research Fellow at School of Engineering, London South Bank University, London, UK
  • R.A. Grant | Senior Lecturer at Manchester Metropolitan University, Manchester, UK
Views 5941
Reading time 4 min
published on Jul 13, 2020
Capturing the past using DNA from Sacred Ibis Mummies

Animals were significant to the ancient Egyptians as they considered them Gods living on earth. By far, the most numerous mummies found are those of the Sacred Ibis, worshipped as the incarnation of the God Thoth. Thoth was the God responsible for maintaining the universe,... click to read more

  • Sally Wasef | Lecturer at Australian Research Centre for Human Evolution, Environmental Futures Research Institute, Griffith University, Queensland, Australia
  • David Lambert | Professor at Australian Research Centre for Human Evolution, Environmental Futures Research Institute, Griffith University, Queensland, Australia
Views 5194
Reading time 3.5 min
published on Jul 6, 2020
Secrets of legless leapers revealed

While we marvel at falcons, cheetahs, and dolphins for their remarkable skills at flying, running, and swimming, we tend to belittle more humble creatures. Among the most lowly are worms, with their unsophisticated crawling and wriggling. However, the biological world holds an endless array of... click to read more

  • Michael J. Wise | Professor at Roanoke College, Environmental Studies Department, Virgina, USA
Views 4470
Reading time 3.5 min
published on Jun 17, 2020
Early chewing and swallowing

Chewing and controlled swallowing are requirements for efficient food ingestion and civilized table manners. Active muscle-powered swallowing is typical mammalian and differentiates mammals, including humans, from other vertebrates. Reptiles, such as crocodiles and birds, devour their unchewed prey in huge chunks or even entirely (e.g.,... click to read more

  • Thomas Martin | Professor at Section Palaeontology, Institute of Geosciences, Rheinische Friedrich-Wilhelms-Universität Bonn, Bonn, Germany
Views 3733
Reading time 3.5 min
published on Jun 11, 2020
Living the high life: the early arrival of hunter-gatherers in the glaciated Ethiopian Highlands

Eastern Africa is known for a vast number of famous archaeological and paleoanthropological findings. Among those, the discovery of the 3.2 million-year-old skeleton "Lucy" in the Afar region. Excavations of fossils and archaeological remains over the last decades shed light on the hominin evolution. They... click to read more

  • Alexander R. Groos | PhD student at Institute of Geography, University of Bern, Bern, Switzerland
Views 5157
Reading time 3.5 min
published on May 29, 2020