Men and women often enter relationships with different long-term goals. In the animal world, differences in approaches to reproductive success can lead to sexual conflict. In a new study, scientists show that sexual conflicts can evolve rapidly in natural populations, driven by competition among males for mating success. Now, in a new study, scientists of the University of Oregon and…
According to a new study published online in the journal BMC Evolutionary Biology, the most recent common ancestor of all snakes was a nocturnal, stealth-hunting predator that had tiny hindlimbs with ankles and toes. The results strongly suggest that snakes originated on land, rather than in the seas, as the oldest snake fossils currently known – Coniophis, Najash, and Dinilysia – are…
When birds got their wings, they lost the clawed fingers wielded by their dinosaur relatives. But they evolved a new “finger”—in their face. And what a boon that has been. Agile beaks of all shapes and sizes, from the gulping gape of a pelican to the needle nose of a hummingbird, have enabled the 10,000 avian species to thrive from…
When scientists first made contact with an isolated village of Yanomami hunter-gatherers in the remote mountains of the Amazon jungle of Venezuela in 2009, they marveled at the chance to study the health of people who had never been exposed to Western medicine or diets. But much to their surprise, these Yanomami’s gut bacteria have already evolved a diverse array…
Scientists who study canine origins seem to fight about everything: where dogs arose, when this happened, and even the best way to find these answers. But there’s one thing most of them agree on: how dogs became domesticated. Still, it’s taken almost a century to get here, and the details are still emerging. So what did happen? Most experts now think dogs…
Studies of hunters and gatherers — and of chimpanzees, which are often used as stand-ins for human ancestors — have cast bigger, faster and more powerful males in the hunter role. Now, a 10-year study of chimpanzees in Senegal shows females playing an unexpectedly big role in hunting and males, surprisingly, letting smaller and weaker hunters keep their prey. The results do…