Exceptionally preserved fossils from the Ediacaran period challenge what scientists thought was possible in sandstone. In the fossil record, creatures without hard shells or skeletons, such as ...

Why do you have five fingers? Why not ten, or twenty, or one? Why do so many animals have five fingers? Five seems to be the perfect number for most hands. Oddly, the first vertebrates to come onto ...

Scientists use a novel application of chromosomal analysis to finally answer a question that has challenged biologists for over a century. When you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an ...

Despite recent advances in the study of eukaryogenesis, much remains unresolved about the origin and evolution of the most complex domain of life. This year, University of Paris-Saclay biologist ...

Defense systems found in all complex life on Earth came from "Asgard." The ancestor of plants, animals and fungi evolved around 2 billion years ago, likely from a group of complex microbes called ...

A study has found evidence that the evolution of tree roots over 300 million years ago triggered mass extinction events through the same chemical processes created by pollution in modern oceans and ...

An international team of scientists has created the largest and most detailed bird family tree ever, spanning 93 million years and representing 92% of bird families species, using cutting-edge ...

Birds are the most diverse land vertebrate on the planet, and now scientists have constructed a complete evolutionary tree of the 11,000 or so known species. This data came from hundreds of studies ...

In the 2012 computer animated movie The Lorax (based on the Dr. Seuss book of the same name and now streaming on Peacock!) the residents of Thneedville live in a world without trees. Unfettered greed ...