An unusual study of an animal social network suggests that ending up as the butt of unfriendly interactions could be in part inherited. sciencenewsThe study, in yellow-bellied marmots, gives the first look beyond people at what facets of social relationships might have genetic components, says coauthor Daniel Blumstein of UCLA. It’s receiving incoming social attention, particularly in grouchy interactions,... 

To watch the uncanny synchronization of a starling flock in flight is to wonder if the birds aren’t actually a single entity, governed by something beyond the usual rules of biology. New research suggests that’s true. Mathematical analysis of flock dynamics show how each starling’s movement is influenced by every other starling, and vice versa. It doesn’t matter how large a flock is, or if... 

While the oil disaster’s terrible toll on birds and turtles will at least be measured, less charismatic creatures tend to be ignored. That’s why conservationists are organizing a citizen science project to count the Gulf Coast’s ghost crabs. Also known as sand crabs, they’re not classically cute, but they’re an important part of coastal food webs. Because the crabs are relatively easy to... 

In the popular imagination, the colossal squid is fast and terrifying, able to dispatch whales and submarines with ease. But the image of the squid as a nasty predator of the deep is probably more mythology than biology argue Rui Rosa of the Laboratorio Marıtimo da Guia in Lisbon and Brad Seibel of the University of Rhode Island in a new paper. These huge squid, which can weigh more than 1,100 pounds,... 

The wings were willing, but the feathers were weak. Delicate, thin-shafted plumage would have made flapping difficult if not impossible for two prehistoric birds, a new analysis of fossil feathers suggests. sciencenews Their feathers probably would have buckled or snapped during strong flapping or sharp maneuvers, so the primitive birds may have been limited to gliding, says Robert Nudds, an evolutionary... 

After ravens see a friend get a beat down, they approach the victim and appear to console it, according to new research. Orlaith Fraser and her co-author Thomas Bugnyar watched the aftermath of 152 fights over a two year period between 13 hand-reared young adult ravens housed at the Konrad Lorenz Research Station in Austria. What they found was the first evidence for birds consoling one another. “It’s... 

From wings to low-density bones to echolocation, the evolution of flight in bats required many radical changes. But the most important change may have been metabolic. A genetic comparison of dozens of mammal species shows that bats possess highly modified versions of genes responsible for turning food into energy. Improved energy efficiency would have encouraged their ancestors to move from treetop... 

In the muck of the deep Mediterranean seafloor, scientists have found the first multicellular animals capable of surviving in an entirely oxygen-free environment. Some types of bacteria and other single-celled organisms can live without oxygen, but nothing as complex had been found as these three species of Loricifera, a group of marine-sediment dwellers who inhabit one of Earth’s most extreme and... 

Birds, bats and lizards may play an important role in Earth’s climate by protecting plants from insects that forage on foliage. A new study suggests that preserving these animals could be a low-tech way to fight climate change. “The presence, abundance and diversity of birds, bats and lizards, the top predators in the insect world, has impacts on the growth of plants,” said ecologist Daniel... 

Bats are nocturnal, but some need sunlight to set their internal compass. “Recent evidence suggests that bats can detect the geomagnetic field,” wrote Max Planck Institute ornithologists Richard Holland, Ivailo Borissov and Bjorn Siemers in an article published March 29 in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. “We demonstrate that homing greater mouse-eared bats calibrate a magnetic... 

Bats can subtly adjust the frequency of the sounds they use to do echolocation to adjust to particularly cluttered terrain. In a laboratory testing room filled with dangling plastic chains, bats wearing tiny, half-gram microphones were recorded flying through the obstacle course. When confronted with the forest of chains, the bats tended to reduce or increase the sounds they emitted by a few kilohertz.... 

Geologists have turned a series of 200 million-year-old lake-bed sediments into an epic narrative of the dinosaurs’ journey from ecological obscurity to Earthly supremacy, a mystery that has lingered even as their disappearance is explained. The dino path to dominance appears to have been cleared when the supercontinent Pangea cracked, setting off 600,000 years of volcanic activity that wiped out... 

A bitter controversy is brewing over a captive colony of endangered Virginia big-eared bats, founded in November as a hedge against disease driving the species to extinction in the wild. Of 40 bats put in the colony, only 10 have survived. According to environmental activists and a consultant to the project, their demise wasn’t just an unfortunate consequence of the animals’ sensitivity, but a... 

A one-of-a-kind killer whale population appears to be threatened by human appetites for Antarctic toothfish, better known to restaurant-goers as Chilean Sea Bass. As fishing fleets patrol their waters, catching what was their primary source of food, the whales are vanishing. It’s not certain whether they’ve only moved on, or are dying out, or both. But something is happening, with potentially... 

The connection between gut bacteria and obesity has gained some weight, with new findings demonstrating links in mice among immune-system malfunction, bacterial imbalance and increased appetite. Mice with altered immune systems developed metabolic disorders and were prone to overeating. When microbes from their stomachs were transplanted into other mice, they also become obese. “This supports the... 

Scientists have discovered 243-million-year-old fossils of dinosaurs’ closest relatives, pushing back the origin of dinosaurs by at least 10 million years. The dinosaur-like creature, Asilisaurus kongwe, was about the size of a Labrador retriever and had teeth and jawbones ideally shaped for eating plants, indicating it ate a mostly vegetarian diet. “This shows that the lineage leading to dinosaurs... 

How all-female species avoid the shrinkage of their gene pool is among the animal kingdom’s great mysteries. Now biologists think they’ve discovered the trick. According to a study published Sunday in Nature, egg-producing cells in a ladies-only species of whiptail lizard contain double the standard genetic complement. They pick the healthiest set of chromosomes, preventing the loss of vital variation. In... 

Scientists have unearthed an almost perfectly preserved spider fossil in China dating back to the middle Jurassic era, 165 million years ago. The fossilized spiders, Eoplectreurys gertschi, are older than the only two other specimens known by around 120 million years. The level of detail preserved in the fossils is amazing, said paleontologist Paul Selden of the University of Kansas and lead author... 

With feathers that resonate at precisely 1,500 hertz, the male club-winged manakin is perhaps the bird world’s most perfectly tuned example of sexual selection. By pinning down the frequency, researchers have completed a long investigation into the bird’s sonic physiology and showed just how far some guys go to impress the ladies. “The fundamental anatomy of the wings has been completely reworked...