Tag: biology
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Lungs and limbs… Fish and wolves…
Lungs and limbs have been thought of as key innovations that came with the vertebrate transition from water to land. But in fact, the genetic basis of air-breathing and limb movement was already established in our fish ancestor 50 million years earlier, according to a recent genome mapping of primitive fish. The new study changes…
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Behavioral interactions. A self being…
Biologists often study animal sociality by collecting observations about behavioral interactions. These interactions can be things like severe or minor fights, cooperative food sharing or grooming. But to analyze animal behavior, researchers need to make decisions about how to categorize and code these interactions. That gets tricky. (1) Push. Push back. Who did start the…
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Researching. Saying too much. Saying nothing…
New research explains how a ‘stop-start’ pattern of evolution, governed by environmental change, could explain why crocodiles have changed so little since the age of the dinosaurs. (1) Does the species change? Due to evolution. Does it stay stable? Due to evolution. Beware of how broad is what you say. You might end up in…
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New genes! New inventions! So?! (Me!)
Thanks to the marine worm Platynereis dumerilii, an animal whose genes have evolved very slowly, scientists have shown that while haemoglobin appeared independently in several species, it actually descends from a single gene transmitted to all by their last common ancestor. (1) Things discovered. Only because they would anyway be. By someone else. In the…
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Being human… Not being one…
With only 1 percent difference, the human and chimpanzee protein-coding genomes are remarkably similar. Understanding the biological features that make us human is part of a fascinating and intensely debated line of research. Researchers have developed a new approach to pinpoint adaptive human-specific changes in the way genes are regulated in the brain. (1) But…
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