Birds Masturbate More Often Than We Thought and Scientists Say It’s Completely Normal
A new evolutionary analysis suggests the behavior appears across many bird groups
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More than 60% of the water in a wood frog's body can freeze solid each winter: its heart stops, it stops breathing, and for more than 7 months it can lie essentially a frogsicle, before it thaws out i
Freezing solid is supposed to be the end. Ice forming inside a body generally stops the chemistry of life. For almost every animal on Earth, that is exactly how...
Killer Whales Teach Their Children To Beach Themselves — A Biologist Explains Why
Along remote coastlines, killer whale parents teach their young how to intentionally beach themselves for prey in a tradition passed down for generations.
The Hidden Algorithms Of The Natural World
Every organism you have ever seen, every ecosystem you have ever walked through, is the ongoing output of an algorithm that has been running without interruptio...
Scientists Discover a Hidden Cause of Cellular Aging That Can Be Reversed
Scientists identified phosphatidylcholine loss as a key driver of mitochondrial aging and showed that restoring it can rejuvenate cellular energy networks.
[2606.02080] Agentic-J: An AI Agent for Biological Microscopy Image Analysis
Abstract page for arXiv paper 2606.02080: Agentic-J: An AI Agent for Biological Microscopy Image Analysis
Zombie Chunks of Sea Cucumber Refuse to Die, Raising Questions About What It Means to Live Forever
An amputated sample of the sea creature not only survived for three years on its own, it also managed to regenerate and grow.
HMGB1 as a Hormetic Stressor in the Response to Exercise
In a sense, exercise is damaging. It places stress on cells, but we have evolved to react to that stress and damage with greater maintenance, repair, and a shif...
Cats can't taste sweetness — evolution turned off the relevant gene in their distant ancestors when they became obligate carnivores, and without working sweet receptors, a cat is as indifferent to sug
Cats are notoriously indifferent to sweet things. Pour syrup near a dog and the dog will investigate. Pour syrup near a cat and the cat will ignore it. Veterina...
Telomere maintenance by recombination in human cells
Telomeres of eukaryotic chromosomes contain many tandem repeats of a G-rich sequence (for example, TTAGGG in vertebrates1). In most normal human cells, telomere...
Yet Another Proposed Definition for Allostatic Load
Allostatic load is a fairly fuzzy concept, meaning the degree of wear and tear on the body that acts degrades its ability to resist stress and function correctl...
[2605.31562] Effective Biological Representation Learning by Masking Gene Expression
Abstract page for arXiv paper 2605.31562: Effective Biological Representation Learning by Masking Gene Expression
A Sea Cucumber's Amputated Tissue Refuses To Die. Could It Live Forever?
The oceans are home to many of Earth's longest living creatures.
Some humans are both male and female, and can (but shouldn't) have children with themselves — LessWrong
A community blog devoted to refining the art of rationality
Peroxisomal DBP deficiency causes male infertility through disruption of lipid homeostasis in Drosophila - Cellular and Molecular Life Sciences
Peroxisomes are essential organelles in almost all eukaryotic cells with a variety of functions in cellular metabolism, including β-oxidation of very-
How plants summon help
Discover how beans signal distress to attract predators of their pests, revealing a crucial plant-defense mechanism.
Wasp Colonies Explode Into Violence After Losing Their Queen
The loss of a queen triggers intense battles for power among female wasps, disrupting the colony’s social structure.
Honey Badgers Survive Snake Bites That Kill Humans — A Biologist Explains How
Honey badgers became internet legends for seeming fearless, but the real science behind their cobra resistance is even stranger.
Owl monkeys have gotten heavier as temps have risen
Owl monkeys have gotten heavier as temperatures rise—a result that defies long-standing expectations about how animals adapt to warm climates
Sunday: Hili dialogue
Welcome to Sunday, May 31, Sabbath for goyische cats and World Parrot Day. I can do no better than show a great photograph of a very rare and unusual parrot,?...
The secret to pigeons’ incredible navigation was hiding in their liver
Scientists have uncovered a surprising navigation system in pigeons: iron-filled immune cells in the liver that may act like tiny magnetic sensors. Birds depriv...
Scientists Discover Some “Zombie Cells” May Actually Help You Live Longer
Scientists are discovering that some of the cells linked to aging may also be key to staying healthy.
Why Scientists Just Launched Artificial Human Embryos Into Space
Space wreaks havoc on the adult human body, so it’s safe to assume it can probably do a number on an embryo and newborn.
‘Mind-blowing’: Iron-rich immune cells help homing pigeons navigate · Flipso
New study identifies a surprising mechanism for sensing Earth’s magnetic field
Nbs1 is essential for DNA repair by homologous recombination in higher vertebrate cells
Double-strand breaks occur during DNA replication and are also induced by ionizing radiation. There are at least two pathways which can repair such breaks: non-...
Massive Scottish wrens demonstrate island gigantism in action
Scientists have identified species of wren that have almost doubled in size due to a unique evolutionary phenomenon.
Surprisingly smart jumping spiders can dream and recognize friends, despite poppy-seed sized brain
Jumping spiders have tiny and relatively simple brains, but scientists are discovering they are among the smartest invertebrates on the planet.
Pigeon's Liver May Be Key to Its Navigational Skills
A surprising gut feeling may be helping pigeons find their way home. Pigeons are a well-known group of frequent fliers that can traverse hundreds of miles in a ...
Severed sea cucumber appendages don’t seem to die
They seem to reorganize their tissues and then just keep living.
'Immortal' tendencies observed in severed sea cucumber tissues
Scientists discovered that amputated tissue from a cold-water sea cucumber can heal, and grow in natural seawater for over three years.