Quick-learning cuttlefish pass 'the marshmallow test'

Much like the popular TikTok challenge where kids resist eating snacks, cuttlefish can do the same! Cuttlefish can delay gratification—wait for a better meal rather than be tempted by the one at hand—and those that can ...

Imaging the first moments of a body plan emerging in the embryo

Egg cells start out as round blobs. After fertilization, they begin transforming into people, dogs, fish, or other animals by orienting head to tail, back to belly, and left to right. Exactly what sets these body orientation ...

How the insect got its wings: Scientists (at last!) tell the tale

It sounds like a "Just So Story"—"How the Insect Got its Wings"—but it's really a mystery that has puzzled biologists for over a century. Intriguing and competing theories of insect wing evolution have emerged in recent ...

The wily octopus: King of flexibility

Octopuses have the most flexible appendages known in nature, according to a new study in Scientific Reports. In addition to being soft and strong, each of the animal's eight arms can bend, twist, elongate and shorten in many ...

To push or to pull? How many-limbed marine organisms swim

When you think of swimming, you probably imagine pushing through the water—creating backwards thrust that pushes you forward. New research at the Marine Biological Laboratory (MBL) suggests instead that many marine animals ...

First gene knockout in cephalopod achieved

A team at the Marine Biological Laboratory (MBL) has achieved the first gene knockout in a cephalopod using the squid Doryteuthis pealeii, an exceptionally important research organism in biology for nearly a century. The ...

Desert algae shed light on desiccation tolerance in green plants

Deserts of the U.S. Southwest are extreme habitats for most plants, but, remarkably, microscopic green algae live there that are extraordinarily tolerant of dehydration. These tiny green algae (many just a few microns in ...

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