Cuttlefish are masters of disguise, able to change their skin colour in less than a second to hide from predators or draw in prey for the kill. Now, scientists from MIT and elsewhere are developing cuttlefish-inspired electronic ink and screens that use less than one-hundredth the power of traditional television screens
The discovery of giant trilobites in northern Portugal reveals the once ubiquitous marine creature mated en masse and used its numbers for protection. The new find, published in the current issue of the journal Geology describes giants that grew to 90 centimetres in length, the largest ever found
Highlighting a vast underestimation
of Madagascar’s natural riches, up to 221 new species of amphibians have been found on the island country. The find nearly doubles the number of known amphibians in Madagascar. An international team of scientists discovered the new species after collecting 2,850 specimens from more than 170 sites, including the country’s most visited and studied national parks
Adding small amounts of metal to spider silk — a material already stronger and lighter than steel — makes it up to 10 times tougher. The scientists devised a way to incorporate zinc, titanium and aluminium ions into natural spider silk. They say the method could one day prove useful for creating super-strong textiles, surgical thread or even synthetic bones
A cloned beagle named Ruppy — short for Ruby Puppy — is the world’s first transgenic dog. She and four other beagles all produce a fluorescent protein that glows red under ultraviolet light. A team led by Byeong-Chun Lee of Seoul National University in South Korea created the dogs by cloning fibroblast cells that express a red fluorescent gene produced by sea anemones. Lee and stem cell researcher Woo Suk Hwang were part of a team that created the first cloned dog, SnuppyMovie Camera, in 2005. Much of Hwang’s work on human cells turned out to be fraudulent, but Snuppy was not, an investigation later concluded
A pet dog which was washed overboard and believed drowned has been found four months later — as a castaway on a remote Australian island. Sophie Tucker — named after the famous US entertainer — vanished as Jan and Dave Griffith sailed through stormy waters off Queensland last November. But unknown to her grieving owners, the plucky dog survived a long swim across shark-infested waters to an island. There she lived on a diet of baby goats until being found by visiting rangers. The Griffiths were amazed to hear of the discovery and have now been reunited with their pet
A recent Raincoast Conservation Foundation research study in British Columbia has shown there are significant differences between gray wolves and the coastal variety. Chris Darimont from UC-Santa Cruz has a doctorate in wolf ecology and was one of the researchers studying the unique wolves for the last five years. They are truly island wolves. They swim between foraging patches on islands, such as in the Broken Group or Clayoquot Sound. We are saying, tongue-in-cheek, that this is our newest marine mammal,
stated Darimont. On the coast and neighboring islands there are only small deer to provide meat, so they adapted to using seafood in their diets. On the islands furthest away from the mainland, 75% of their food intake comes from the sea
Researchers say a chimpanzee at a Swedish zoo has proven that apes are as capable of forward planning as humans. Zoo minders have uncovered hundreds of stone caches being used by the chimp to hoard ammunition to hurl at visitors. The chimp at the centre of this study, an alpha male in his 30s called Santino, lives at Furuvik Zoo to the north of Stockholm
Truman, a 7-foot-long, 30-pound octopus at the New England Aquarium squeezed his body into a 14-inch square acrylic box today in pursuit of food, aquarium officials said. The 30-minute performance drew a crowd of staff and guests. The caretakers for the octopi at the aquarium place food inside locked boxes as an enrichment activity. The idea is that the animals, who are very intelligent, must figure out how to unlatch the boxes and get the food, aquarium officials said in a news release
An octopus managed to pry loose a water-control valve at the Santa Monica Pier Aquarium, flooding the facility with more than 200 gallons of saltwater. The valve is inside the sea creature’s tank, and officials think the octopus grabbed hold of it while exploring. A worker arriving in the morning found water overflowing out of the tank and a lovely little lake
on the floor — about 3 inches of water that damaged newly installed carpets, as well as walls and facades
— via OneCelledCreature
A chemical from an ocean-dwelling sponge can reprogram antibiotic resistant bacteria to make them vulnerable to medicines again, new evidence suggests. Ineffective antibiotics become lethal once again for bacteria treated with the sponge compound, chemist Peter Moeller reported 13 February at the American Association for the Advancement of Science annual meeting
Photovoltaics, which convert sunlight into electricity, have long been touted as one of the most promising solutions to our energy needs. Unfortunately, today’s devices reflect a lot of solar energy as heat, which means that solar power is currently not as cheap as other forms of energy. Now, however, researchers in the Netherlands have developed an anti-reflective coating based on the nanostructure of a moth’s eyes, which could reduce the reflection from photovoltaic cells and thereby make them more efficient
The Pyrenean ibex, a form of wild mountain goat, was officially declared extinct in 2000 when the last-known animal of its kind was found dead in northern Spain. Shortly before its death, scientists preserved skin samples of the goat, a subspecies of the Spanish ibex that live in mountain ranges across the country, in liquid nitrogen. Using DNA taken from these skin samples, the scientists were able to replace the genetic material in eggs from domestic goats, to clone a female Pyrenean ibex, or bucardo as they are known. It is the first time an extinct animal has been cloned
The Turritopsis Nutricula is able to revert back to a juvenile form once it mates after becoming sexually mature. Marine biologists say the jellyfish numbers are rocketing because they need not die
Emperor penguins, whose long treks across Antarctic ice to mate have been immortalised by Hollywood, are heading towards extinction, scientists say. Based on predictions of sea ice extent from climate change models, the penguins are likely to see their numbers plummet by 95% by 2100
— via Russia Today
It’s not the first time researchers have tried to emulate flapping as a way to fly aircraft, but US Air Force funded researchers are now looking at how bats move to develop future micro-aircraft. According to USAF researchers, birds, bats and insects have some highly varied mechanical properties that researchers have not utilised in engineering flight vehicles. The idea is to reproduce bat mechanics and develop technology could lead to small, remote controlled aircraft that could move in places where fixed wing aircraft have a hard time like interiors of buildings, caves or tunnels, researchers said
Rare footage of one of the world’s most strange and elusive mammals has been captured by scientists. Large, and with a long, thin snout, the Hispaniolan solenodon resembles an overgrown shrew; it can inject passing prey with a venom-loaded bite. Little is known about the creature, which is found in the Caribbean, but it is under threat from deforestation, hunting and introduced species. Researchers say conservation efforts are now needed
Australia’s use of coal and carbon emissions policies are guaranteeing the destruction of much of the life on the planet
, a leading NASA scientist has written in a letter to Barack Obama. The head of NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies, Professor James Hansen, has written an open letter to Barack Obama calling for a moratorium on coal-fired power stations and the use of next-generation nuclear power
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