Nature Podcast |
Featured
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News |
This sparrow massively expands part of its brain in preparation for mating
The trick baffles researchers — but they are getting closer to understanding how the songbird does it.
- Anil Oza
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News |
These bats are the first mammals found to have non-penetrative mating
A European bat has been captured on film engaging in what appears to be an unusual reproductive strategy.
- Gayathri Vaidyanathan
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News |
CRISPR and ‘e-ink’: new tools could reveal the secrets of cuttlefish camouflage
Technology moves scientists closer than ever to understanding how colour-blind cuttlefish pull off their kaleidoscopic patterns.
- Max Kozlov
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Research Briefing |
Impact of a catastrophic tropical cyclone on large African mammals
In 2019, Cyclone Idai caused devastating flooding in Mozambique’s Gorongosa National Park when ecological studies of mammals were already under way. Small-bodied species and those in low-lying areas were affected most, suggesting that animals’ sensitivity to extreme weather depends on traits such as body size and habitat use.
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News & Views |
Dopamine determines how reward overrides risk
Why do animals pursue reward in the face of punishment? Dopamine-releasing neurons that promote reward-seeking behaviour indirectly impair those that encode punishment avoidance, affecting decisions on risk.
- Kristin M. Scaplen
- & Karla R. Kaun
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News |
Mysterious mouse mummies found atop lofty volcanoes
Naturally freeze-dried leaf-eared mice found above 6,000 metres show mammals can dwell at extraordinary heights.
- Anil Oza
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News & Views |
From the archive: animal behaviour, and Darwin discusses organ loss
Snippets from Nature’s past.
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Nature Index |
Three scientists on the front line of climate and conservation research
By bearing firsthand witness to how the climate crisis is affecting life and livelihoods, their fieldwork directly informs policy to protect vulnerable sites.
- Sandy Ong
- & Andy Tay
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Nature Podcast |
Audio long read: These animals are racing towards extinction. A new home might be their last chance
Researchers are testing a controversial strategy to relocate threatened animals whose habitats might not survive climate change.
- Clare Watson
- & Benjamin Thompson
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Research Highlight |
Snow-loving flies amputate their own legs for survival
Insects that traipse across winter snowfields use harsh technique to keep their internal organs from freezing.
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News |
How to train your jellyfish: brainless box jellies learn from experience
Researchers have shown that the creatures can learn to avoid obstacles using visual and mechanical cues, despite not having a brain.
- Dyani Lewis
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News & Views |
The neural circuit that makes maternal mice respond to pups’ cries
All newborn mammals cry. The neural circuit that stimulates mothers to look after crying offspring has been identified in mice — along with a mechanism that promotes maternal behaviour only after prolonged calls from pups.
- Flavia Ricciardi
- & Cristina Márquez
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Nature Podcast |
Why does cancer spread to the spine? Newly discovered stem cells might be the key
A stem cell vital for vertebral growth also drives spine metastases, and the use of MDMA in the treatment of PTSD.
- Benjamin Thompson
- & Shamini Bundell
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Research Highlight |
This parrot taps out beats — and it custom-builds its instruments
Male palm cockatoos prefer certain types of percussion tool, which they create themselves from branches and seed pods.
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News Feature |
These animals are racing towards extinction. A new home might be their last chance
Some of the most threatened animals might not survive in their current habitat because of climate change. Researchers are testing a controversial strategy to relocate them before it’s too late — starting with Australia’s rarest reptile.
- Clare Watson
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Research Briefing |
Peering into bats’ brains as the animals fly and feed together
Many animals, including humans, live together and move in coordination with others, but little is known about how neurons represent or govern such complex behaviours. By studying free-flying bats, we found that neural activity in a region of the brain called the hippocampus contains a rich representation of the spatial and social environment that could support collective behaviour.
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Research Briefing |
Neural basis of why mammals eat more in the cold
Feeding and the maintenance of internal body temperature are tightly linked in warm-blooded animals, and mammals eat more in the cold to maintain their body heat. Experiments reveal that a small nucleus in the brain’s thalamus controls feeding behaviour specifically in cold conditions by directly activating a reward centre in the brain.
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News & Views |
Replication study casts doubt on magnetic sensing in flies
It has long been thought that the fly Drosophila melanogaster can detect Earth’s magnetic field and offers an ideal system in which to examine this enigmatic sense. However, a rigorous replication of key studies fails to support this idea.
- Eric J. Warrant
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News & Views |
From the archive: pollination, and Charles Darwin ponders scared ants
Snippets from Nature’s past.
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Book Review |
To save bears, we must learn to live alongside them
With urban areas expanding and climate change shrinking bears’ habitats, the animals’ interactions with humans will make — or break — efforts to preserve their populations.
- Henry Nicholls
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Nature Video |
First glimpses inside octopus’s sleeping brains reveals human-like patterns
Neural activity show an ‘active’ sleep stage similar to REM sleep in mammals.
- Shamini Bundell
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Nature Podcast |
Do octopuses dream? Neural activity resembles human sleep stages
Brain probes reveal complexities of octopus sleep, and a hormone that could help make calorie-restricted diets more effective.
- Benjamin Thompson
- & Shamini Bundell
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Research Highlight |
Dolphin mums whistle ‘baby talk’ with their calves
The calls of dolphin mothers had a higher pitch when they were accompanied by their young.
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Book Review |
Is ‘speciesism’ as bad as racism or sexism?
We are all complicit in a global farming industry that puts profit before animal welfare — but establishing what moral principles we should be applying isn’t easy, an update of a classic book shows.
- Jonathan Birch
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Where I Work |
How I use science to protect my people’s birthright
Jean-Luc Kanapé combines the ancestral knowledge of his Indigenous Canadian community, the Innu, with technology to protect the region’s caribou from predators and environmental damage.
- Patricia Maia Noronha
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Research Briefing |
A battle between neural circuits for infanticide and maternal-care behaviours
A previously unknown neural circuit in the brains of female mice is activated during infanticidal behaviour, and reciprocally inhibits another circuit that promotes maternal-care behaviour. These circuits show opposing changes in excitability when female mice become mothers, explaining the switch in young-directed behaviours that occurs with motherhood.
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News |
Deaths of African cheetahs in India shine spotlight on controversial conservation project
Scientists fear that an Indian park is not enough space for the planned population — and that not enough work has been done with locals on how they will respond to the animals.
- Gayathri Vaidyanathan
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Nature Podcast |
A brain circuit for infanticide, in mice
Research reveals system underlying behaviour change towards young, and identifying the source of fast solar wind.
- Noah Baker
- & Nick Petrić Howe
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News |
Biggest ever study of primate genomes has surprises for humanity
Genomes of humans’ closest relatives provide insight for conservation, human disease and the origins of social structures.
- Dyani Lewis
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Research Highlight |
These hardy ants build their own landmarks in the desert
Ants living on the sprawling salt pans of Tunisia use DIY markers to find their way home.
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News |
Does the roar of rocket launches harm wildlife? These scientists seek answers
With rocket lift-offs set to increase drastically, a team will monitor the effects of noise pollution at a California spaceport.
- Nicola Jones
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Research Highlight |
How can mosquitoes find you? All you have to do is exhale
Free-flying mosquitoes gravitate toward pads that emit carbon dioxide, which is found in human breath.
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News |
Hammerhead sharks are first fish found to ‘hold their breath’
It pays to be an warm hunter in the cold ocean depths, so the animals shut down oxygen intake to conserve heat.
- Bianca Nogrady
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Research Highlight |
Your favourite soap might turn you into a mosquito magnet
Mosquitoes tend to prefer the scent of Dawn and Dial over the odour of an unwashed person.
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Research Highlight |
What drives a scavenger’s diet? Vulture culture
Griffon vultures in northern Spain fill up at landfills, but their southern brethren prefer the carcasses of wild animals.
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Nature Careers Podcast |
How trauma’s effects can pass from generation to generation
Neuroepigenetics researcher Isabelle Mansuy investigates how life life experiences and environmental factors can shape not only us, but also our descendants.
- Dom Byrne
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News & Views |
An evolutionary route to warning coloration
Bright colours that signal toxicity can deter predators, but how such colours initially evolve without first endangering conspicuous organisms is a contentious issue. Analysis of amphibians offers an answer to the puzzle.
- Tim Caro
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Research Highlight |
Better than Chanel: perfumed male bees draw more mates
A daub of floral scent gives male orchid bees a leg-up on fathering offspring.
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Nature Video |
‘Touch-taste’: how the octopus repurposed its nervous system to hunt
Researchers identify the structural basis for octopuses chemo-tactile sense.
- Dan Fox
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Nature Podcast |
Octopuses hunt by ‘tasting’ with their suckers
The receptors that help octopuses sense by touch, plus a round-up of stories from the Nature Briefing.
- Benjamin Thompson
- & Nick Petrić Howe
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News |
How octopuses taste with their arms
Ultra-specialized proteins enable octopuses and squids to taste surfaces with their suckers — and these proteins are tailored to each animal’s way of life.
- Sara Reardon
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News & Views |
From the archive: new words to describe human–machine relationships, and a demonstration of the perceptual abilities of butterflies
Snippets from Nature’s past.
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News & Views |
From the archive: the wonders of life contained in the soil, and the sociability of cats
Snippets from Nature’s past.
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Research Briefing |
Birdsong sequences initiated by a small cluster of cells in the brain
The zebra finch’s courtship song consists of a fixed sequence of vocal elements called syllables. A small structure in the thalamus, deep in the brain, forms connections with a set of nerve cells that become active at the beginning of syllables, thereby initiating components of the finch’s vocal repertoire.
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News Feature |
Bats live with dozens of nasty viruses — can studying them help stop pandemics?
Researchers are examining the weird immune systems of bats, hoping to help prevent the next outbreak.
- Smriti Mallapaty
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News & Views |
From the archive: Saturn, and Charles Darwin shares animal stories
Snippets from Nature’s past.
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Where I Work |
Snub-nosed monkeys have taught me important life lessons
Zoologist Zuofu Xiang’s research in Asia helps governments to protect the populations and teaches him the value of cooperation.
- Andy Tay
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Research Highlight |
These baby mice bawl loudly — and Mum rushes over
Very young deer mice make squeaks audible to the human ear as well as ultrasound calls similar to those made by house mouse pups.
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News & Views |
From the archive: ancient mazes, and ants under observation
Snippets from Nature’s past.