Biology

Have you ever stopped to think about how odd humans are? Not, like, in general, but biologically? For one thing, very few other animals walk the way we walk, on just two limbs. Our closest living [...]

The rules of sexual inheritance are simple, right? Half the genes from parent one, the other half from parent two and bada-bing! New organism. What if we told you there is an exception to that [...]

Newborn babies have very immature immune systems, but they aren't completely defenseless against disease. Some antibodies pass from the parent's blood to the fetus' blood during development. But [...]

Looking at a wolf and a German shepherd, it is easy to think: "Sure, related." But what about a wolf and a Pekinese? Have you ever seen those dogs? They look like adorable walking footstools! [...]

What do we do about the microscopic particle of all-things-bad coronavirus? Well, to quote Matt Damon in The Martian: We’re going to have to science the *bleep* out of this. And it's never been [...]

What do a bat, a pig, a mouse, and an opossum have in common? In this lesson plan students will explore both the structural and genetic homology of tetrapods!

Picture it: A giant (like, seriously giant) tray full of bacteria. Billions and billions of bacteria just growing and spreading. A germaphobe's worst nightmare? Nah. These bacteria (like most [...]

Tanning mice. Yep. You read that right. Mice with tans are at the center of this story of how researchers are looking into drugs that can trick our cells into tanning without the sun.

Using DNA analysis, researchers were able to effectively trace the evolution of HIV backwards in time to find the common ancestor of HIV samples circulating among humans today. Why is that [...]

Fins, wings, and...fractions? Find out how simple measurements revealed a striking convergence among animals as varied as whales, birds, and sea butterflies. (Wondering what a sea butterfly is? [...]