Animals, features and articles | Educational Science

Feb 28, 2019

Why Are There So Many Marsupials in Australia?

Australia is the kingdom of marsupials, home to furry kangaroos, koalas and wombats. The continent has so many marsupials, it raises the question: Did these pouch-bearing mammals arise Down Under? The answer is an unqualified (or un-koalafied) no. Marsupials were around for at least 70 million years before they made...

Feb 28, 2019

The Megalodon Spent Tens of Millions of Years Honing Its Lethal, Knife-Like Teeth

But nature didn't just hand these instant-killing weapons to these prehistoric sharks, called megalodons. Rather, it took millions of years for the teeth to evolve into their final, lethal form, according to a new study published on March 1 in the Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology. To understand the evolution of...

Feb 28, 2019

Do Any Animals Know Their Grandparents?

Grandparents are revered in many human societies. But telling stories about old times and overfeeding grandchildren seem like distinctly human traits. Are these classic grandparent behaviors really limited to Homo sapiens? Do any animals know their grandparents the way people do? For most species on Earth, the answer is an...

Feb 28, 2019

Mammoth DNA Briefly 'Woke Up' Inside Mouse Eggs. But Cloning Mammoths Is Still a Pipe Dream.

A handful of 28,0000-year-old woolly mammoth cell parts were recently woken up for a short time in a new experiment, but cloning the ice age beasts is still a long way off. In the experiment, the researchers extracted cells from Yuka, a woolly mammoth mummy (Mammuthus primigenius) whose remains were...

Feb 28, 2019

What Is the Toothiest Animal on Earth?

Peek inside a few animal mouths and you'll see evidence of evolution's finest work. Take snakes, whose teeth are needle-thin and spiked with venom — excruciatingly efficient instruments for killing prey. Or walruses, which use their massive teeth like ice picks to haul their heavy bodies along the ground. In...

Feb 28, 2019

Enormous Great White Shark Pregnant with Record 14 Pups Was Caught and Sold in Taiwan

A large, female great white shark pregnant with a record 14 pups was accidentally caught by fishers off the coast of Taiwan and sold at a fish market on Wednesday (March 20). The enormous mamma was purchased for less than $2,000 by a Taiwanese taxidermy company, Taiwan English News reported....

Jan 31, 2019

This Spiky-Spined Beast Is the Most Punk-Rock Dino Ever Discovered

Some dinosaurs are known for their long necks, others for their horned heads or club-like tails. Bajadasaurus pronuspinax, a newly described dinosaur discovered in Patagonia, Argentina, will be known for its sexy mohawk. In a study published Feb. 4 in the journal Scientific Reports, a team of archaeologists from CONICET,...

Jan 31, 2019

Titanosaur the Size of a School Bus Had Heart-Shaped Tail Bones

A newfound dinosaur seems to wear its heart on its tail, according to paleontologists who found the enormous beast and realized this hopeless romantic had heart-shaped tail bones. But this dinosaur, named Mnyamawamtuka moyowamkia, is extraordinary beyond its lovely tail. Paleontologists spent five years climbing a steep cliff in Tanzania...

Jan 31, 2019

Rarely Glimpsed Scaly Pangolins Caught Hugging Trees in the Dark

See more New video of giant pangolins shows these bizarre scaly creatures in their natural (nocturnal) habitat in Uganda. In the videos, the blunt-nosed creatures — which are the only mammals with scales — are seen meandering about the undergrowth, sniffing for food and danger. In one clip, a baby...

Jan 31, 2019

What the Heck Is a Blobfish?

The canonical blobfish picture elicits squeals of delight and shudders of horror, embodying an eye-catching blend of cute and ugly somewhat unfamiliar to the Western aesthetic (although it's rather popular in Japan). With its derpy frown, glistening flesh and an impossibly human-looking nose reminiscent of the schnoz on Ziggy and...

Jan 31, 2019

This Bird's Body Is Half Male, Half Female. So Is Its Brain.

Male cardinals are red. Female cardinals are tan. The odd bird that's been roosting outside Jeff and Shirley Caldwell's kitchen in Erie, Pennsylvania, is an even split of both. Divided down the middle like a winged black-and-white-cookie, the rare cardinal is plumed in feathers that are scarlet on its right...

Dec 31, 2018

Sheep Ain't Baa-aad at Recognizing Faces (But Humans Are Better)

Facial recognition specialists from Australia recently revisited the 2017 study. They admitted that the experiments provided a compelling demonstration that sheep could differentiate between human faces, but they challenged the authors' conclusion that sheep could recognize faces as well as humans and other primates can. As experts in human facial...

Dec 31, 2018

Why This Enormous, Scaly Foot Looks Like It's from a Dinosaur

A photo showing an enormous, scaly foot that dwarfed the photographer's hand recently captivated Twitter. With muscular digits tipped by powerful claws, the appendage resembles a dinosaur's foot — and that's exactly what it is. The foot's owner was an imposing (though deceased) flightless bird called a southern cassowary (Casuarius...

Dec 31, 2018

What's the world's largest dinosaur?

The battle for the title of world's largest dinosaur is complicated. Here's why: Paleontologists rarely discover an entire skeleton. They're more likely to uncover bone fragments and then try to estimate a profile of height and weight. Moreover, there are three categories for largest dinosaur on record: the weightiest, longest...

Dec 31, 2018

Trevor, the World's Loneliest Duck, Has Died As He Lived — Alone in a Puddle

Live Science is sad to report that Trevor the mallard, billed by some as the world's loneliest duck, has died as he lived — alone in a puddle. Known as the only duck on the small west Pacific island of Niue (population around 1,600), Trevor was found dead in the...