Animals

When we think of camouflage, it’s usually a visual pattern. But how do you hide from a predator that uses sound to find food, like a bat? If you’re a firefly, it turns out you might resort to a cacophony of ultrasound that acts like “musical armor.”

Trilobites are one of the most common creatures found in the fossil record, but now some particularly well-preserved specimens have revealed some intriguing new details. It turns out that trilobites breathed oxygen – through their legs.

The inaugural World Nature Photography Awards has delivered a strong collection of images showcasing the breadth of the planet’s natural wonders. From unusual animal perspectives to spectacular landscapes, here is a selection of highlights.

In the event of a global catastrophe, how would we protect the wide variety of plants and animals on Earth? A team of researchers has now proposed a “Noah’s Ark” on the Moon that stores millions of samples of seeds, spores, sperm and eggs.

It’s normally a leg here or a tail there, but scientists have now discovered one of the most extreme examples of limb regeneration ever seen in an animal – sea slugs that voluntarily detach their own heads and then regrow an entire body from it.

Researchers have identified the oldest known fossils of primates, dating them to 65.9 million years ago. That’s just after one of Earth’s biggest mass extinction events, and it suggests that the ancestor of all primates lived alongside the dinosaurs.

Unlike us, many animals can see ultraviolet light. If you're using a video screen to study their visual perception, therefore, that screen really ought to work in the UV spectrum – and a new one does just that.

A little over two years after Israel-based start-up Aleph Farms unveiled the world’s first lab-grown steak, the company has now revealed a much more complex, thick-cut rib-eye steak cultivated using a novel 3D bioprinting technology.

A tiny new species of chameleon has been discovered, and it may be the smallest reptile in the world. Known as Brookesia nana, or the nano-chameleon, the petite species can perch on a fingertip and may have the smallest adult males of any vertebrate.

Wombats are the only animal in the world known to produce cubic poo. It's, quite literally, akin to squeezing a square peg through a round hole, and now researchers have for the first time replicated the intestinal process that achieves this feat.

Satellites have offered scientists a powerful new tool when it comes to tracking endangered wildlife, with the movements of animals able to be monitored with precision. A new technology promises to expand the possibilities in this area even further.

Paleontologists have found and described what may be the last dinosaur body part we didn’t know anything about – the butthole. Better yet, it seems like it might have evolved to look and yes, even smell, nice to suitors.