Yuganov Konstantin/Shutterstock
Ever been made to feel small? Here’s why being petite is no bad thing.
MisFluffy/Shutterstock
The origin of life on Earth is one of the biggest mysteries in science.
Lichen, the first described example of symbiosis.
AdeJ Artventure/Shutterstock
Symbiosis is so much part of life on Earth that it has shaped the evolution and structure of cells. It’s happening almost everywhere we look, including inside our gut.
Cicadas climb up a tree at the U.S. Capitol in Washington, D.C., during the Brood X emergence in 2021.
Bill Clark/CQ-Roll Call, Inc via Getty Images
The last time that these two groups of cicadas emerged from underground together, Thomas Jefferson was president.
Ryan Boedi/Shutterstock
The extinction of the dinosaurs sparked an explosion of bird species, according to the largest-ever study of bird genetics.
People have collected fossil horses throughout North America for centuries.
Florida Museum/Mary Warrick
Horse fossils are abundant and widespread across North America. Scientists often use their long history to illustrate how species evolve in response to a changing environment.
Rock art showing a hunter-gatherer ritual dance; Kondoa, Tanzania.
Nick Longrich
Neanderthals and humans may have been equally smart and skilled, but some evidence points to humans living in larger groups.
A herd of the duckbill Minqaria bata wander along the shore of what is now Morocco.
Raul Martin
Oceanic dispersal of dinosaurs between Europe and Africa shows how low-probability, high-impact events drive evolution.
Eve – Lucas Cranach the Elder (c.1510)
Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons
The story of human evolution is inextricable from the story of gynaecology.
Male anglerfish are tiny compared to females.
Neil Bromhall/Shutterstock
Does size matter? In the animal kingdom, yes.
Unlike humans, many animals still have tails.
vblinov/Shutterstock
Many evolutionary changes also come with costs.
James Dorey Photography
By lifting their gaze to the treetops rather than poking around on the ground, researchers discovered eight new species of masked bees.
Bacteria are evolutionarily primed to outpace drug developers.
National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, National Institutes of Health/Flickr
The Nobel Prize-winning Luria−Delbrück experiment showed that random mutations in bacteria can allow them to develop resistance by chance.
Bernard Spragg/Flickr
From sacrificial bark to fire-germinating gumnuts to stealthy buds the eucalyptus has evolved an arsenal of protective measures.
olliulli/Shutterstock
Understanding how the ageing of sperm works in other animals is more important than ever as human male fertility is in decline.
IMGP.
Cane toads are evolving as they spread across Australia. Parasitic lungworms are becoming more infectious to keep up.
Ermine moths are deaf, but have an intricate wing structure that protects them from bats by producing warning clicks when they fly.
HWall/Shutterstock
The ermine moth’s wing structures are fascinating because they rely on a mechanism we teach our engineering students to avoid
An artist’s impression of the new pterosaur species, Cheoptera
Mark Witton/Natural History Museum
The Isle of Skye has a rich palaeontological heritage, so perhaps it’s no surprise scientists made an important discovery there.
Nature Uninterrupted Photography/Unsplash
Flowers tend to stand out against a natural background. A new study shows this contrast evolved in a key relationship with their most famous pollinators – bees.
Scarlett Howard
Being susceptible to visual illusions is part and parcel of life not just for humans, but many other species – including bees.