These spiders may have the world’s fastest body clocks
WASHINGTON, D.C. — If it takes you a while to recover from a few lost hours of sleep, be grateful you aren’t an orb weaver. Three orb-weaving spiders — Allocyclosa…
Coconut crabs are a bird’s worst nightmare
Imagine you’re a red-footed booby napping on a not-quite-high-enough branch of a tree. It’s nighttime on an island in the middle of the Indian Ocean, and you can’t see much…
These disease-fighting bacteria produce echoes detectable by ultrasound
Ultrasound can now track bacteria in the body like sonar detects submarines. For the first time, researchers have genetically modified microbes to form gas-filled pouches that scatter sound waves to…
Blowflies use drool to keep their cool
SAN FRANCISCO — Blowflies don’t sweat, but they have raised cooling by drooling to a high art. In hot times, sturdy, big-eyed Chrysomya megacephala flies repeatedly release — and then…
Somewhere in the brain is a storage device for memories
People tend to think of memories as deeply personal, ephemeral possessions — snippets of emotions, words, colors and smells stitched into our unique neural tapestries as life goes on. But…