Scientists “evolve a fungus” claims Science (AAAS) News 4 June 2021, and Scientific Reports 19 May 2021 doi:10.1038/s41598-021-89811-2. Researchers looking for a method of biological control of the Verroa mite, which has devastated honeybee colonies, have found a fungus that attacks and kills the mites. However, the fungus grows poorly in the warm temperatures of […]
Rock hard skeletons resist climate change, according to articles in Rutgers University News 8 April 2021, SciTech Daily 18 April 2021 and, Journal of the Royal Society Interface, 24 February 2021, doi: 10.1098/rsif.2020.0859. Coral reefs are formed as coral animals lay down a hard rock-like material that consists of the mineral aragonite, a type of […]
Octopuses feel the light, according to reports in Inside JEB and Live Science 5 March 2021 and Journal of Experimental Biology 5 March 2021, doi:10.1242/jeb.237529. Whilst studying the response of octopus skin to bright lights scientists at Ruppin Academic Center, Israel, researchers noticed that the animals moved their arms away from the light in a […]
Oldest cephalopods may have been found, claim scientists via reports in ScienceDaily 23 March 2021, Science Alert 25 March2021 and Communications Biology 23 March 2021, doi: 10.1038/s42003-021-01885-w. Scientists at the University of Heidelberg have studied fossils from the Avalon Peninsula, Newfoundland, Canada, and identified them as fossil cephalopods. Living cephalopods include octopuses, squid, cuttlefish and […]
Jellyfish are ecosystem engineers reported in Hakai Magazine 19 February 2020 and bioRxiv 8 November 2019, doi.org/10.1101/784173. Tides and winds keep water flowing in most coastal regions, but in some sheltered areas among mangroves, tides and winds may not penetrate enough to keep the water moving. Scientists at University of South Florida who were studying […]
Oldest fossil scorpions show transition to land, claim scientists in reports in Science (AAAS) News and ScienceDaily 16 January 2020 and Scientific Reports, 16 January 2020 DOI: 10.1038/s41598-019-56010-z. Palaeontologists have studied two “exceptionally preserved” scorpion fossils from the Waukesha Biota, a fossil deposit in Wisconsin, USA. Scorpions are arachnids, the class of invertebrates that also […]
Trilobite processions found, according to CNRS Press Release, National Geographic Science (AAAS) News, National Geographic 17 October 2019, and Scientific Reports 17 October 2019 doi: 10.1038/s41598-019-51012-3. Scientists from the French National Centre for Scientific Research (CNRS) along with other French and Swiss colleagues have studied fossils containing multiple specimens of trilobites named Ampyx priscus dated […]
“Good coral parenting” for reef recovery found, according to reports in ScienceDaily 16 September 2019 and Scientific Reports 16 September 2019, doi: 10.1038/s41598-019-50045-y. Corals live in a symbiotic relationship with algae – single celled plants that provide the coral with a lot of nutrients, as well as giving the corals their colour. When the corals […]
Reef in no trouble at all, says expert in an interview recorded by the Institute of Public Affairs. Dismissed university Professor Peter Ridd, a marine geophysicist at James Cook University, made the following comments about the Great Barrier Reef: “When you bury down to the data about that bleaching event in 2016, at the extreme […]
Coral movements disperse oxygen, according to a report in Inside JEB 9 August 2019 and Journal of Experimental Biology 9 August 2019 doi:10.1242/jeb.192518. Scientists in Israel have studied soft corals named Heteroxenia, which grow in the red sea. These corals have crown of feathery tentacles, arranged like a flower, that constantly fold and unfold in […]