University of Nevada, Reno researcher Matthew Forister is among a group of scientists that have documented an unusual type of speciation in the Sierra Nevada, including a hybrid species of butterfly that can trace its lineage as far back as almost a half a million years ago.

A strikingly unusual animal was recently discovered in the cloud-forests of Peru. The large rodent is about the size of a squirrel and looks a bit like one, except its closest relatives are spiny rats.

The world's first rhino conceived by artificial insemination has been born at Budapest Zoo, officials said in a statement on Wednesday.

Birds use them to reduce the weight of their feathers. Polar bears rely on them to keep warm in the Arctic cold. Now scientists in China report what they believe to be the first easy, straightforward method for making the kind of multi-channel microtubes found in birds, polar bears and other animals.

Carnivores are some of the widest ranging terrestrial mammals for their size, and this affects their energy intake and needs. This difference is also played out in the different hunting strategies of small and large carnivores. Smaller species less than 15-20 kg in weight specialize on very small vertebrates and invertebrates, which weigh a small fraction of their own weight, whereas larger species (>15-20 kg) specialize on large vertebrate prey near their own mass.

The UAB SeRMN is enlarging its facilities to make room for two new cutting-edge machines for nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR). The devices are a Bruker BIOSPEC 70/30 spectrometer with a horizontal magnet, making it possible to carry out magnetic resonance spectroscopy imaging in vivo on animals (from mice to rabbits), and an NMR Bruker AvanceII 600 spectrometer combined with a high-resolution liquid chromatography team and a mass spectrometer.

Fluctuations in weather and the environment affect survival and reproduction of animals. But are all individuals within a population equally susceptible? Theory on the evolution in age-structured populations suggests not - those life stages that are more important for overall fitness should be less susceptible to environmental variation than other life stages.

Andy has sprouted white whiskers, suffers from lower back pain and no longer bounds up the stairs like he used to.

Marine iguanas on the Galápagos Islands live without predators - at least this was the case up until 150 years ago. Since then they have been confronted with cats and dogs on some islands of the Archipelago. For scientists, they are therefore a suitable model of study in order to discover if such generally tame animals are capable of adapting their behaviour and endocrine stress response to novel predation threats.

Voters in Online Naming Poll Selected the name "Mei Lan" for the giant panda born at Zoo Atlanta. Now Zoo Atlanta is joined by the ghengdu research base of giant panda breeding to announce name of giant panda cub.

The decomposition of plant, animal and microbial material in soil and water produces a variety of complex organic molecules, collectively called natural organic matter. These compounds play many important roles in the environment.