We humans can drive species toward extinction by hunting them or destroying their habitat. But we can also threaten them in a more subtle but no less dangerous way: by making them sick.

In the early 1900s, humans introduced malaria-spreading mosquitoes to Hawaii, and many native bird species were decimated. More recently, a fungus introduced to the United States from Europe has proved lethal to several species of bats.

Now, scientists and wildlife managers are struggling to prevent the next infectious disaster.

Continue reading “Importing Both Salamanders and Their Potential Destruction” →

An ant colony is an insect fortress: When enemies invade, soldier ants quickly detect the incursion and rip their foes apart with their oversize mandibles.

But some invaders manage to slip in with ease, none more mystifyingly than the ant nest beetle.

Adult beetles stride into an ant colony in search of a mate, without being harassed. They lay eggs, from which larva hatch. As far as scientists can tell, workers feed the young beetles as if they were ants.

Continue reading “A Social Parasite’s Sophisticated Mimicry” →

A single neuron can’t do much on its own, but link billions of them together into a network and you’ve got a brain.

But why stop there?

In recent years, scientists have wondered what brains could do if they were linked together into even bigger networks. Miguel A. Nicolelis, director of the Center for Neuroengineering at Duke University, and his colleagues have now made the idea a bit more tangible by linking together animal brains with electrodes.

Continue reading “Scientists Demonstrate Animal Mind-Melds” →

The animal kingdom got off to a slow start. Studies on DNA indicate that the first animals evolved more than 750 million years ago, but for well over 200 million years, they left a meager mark on the fossil record. As best as paleontologists can tell, the animal kingdom during that time consisted of little more than sponges and other creatures rooted to the ocean floor.

But then, about 520 million years ago during the Cambrian Period, animal evolution shifted into high gear. Fast-moving predators, scavengers and burrowers evolved. Many of the major living groups of animals left their first fossils during this so-called Cambrian explosion, including our own ancestors.

Continue reading “The Cambrian Explosion’s Strange-Looking Poster Child” →

Certain people, researchers have discovered, can’t summon up mental images — it’s as if their mind’s eye is blind. This month in the journal Cortex, the condition received a name: aphantasia, based on the Greek word phantasia, which Aristotle used to describe the power that presents visual imagery to our minds.

I find research like this irresistible. It coaxes me to think about ways to experience life that are radically different from my own, and it offers clues to how the mind works.

And in this instance, I played a small part in the discovery.

Continue reading “Picture This? Some Just Can’t” →