4+ hour, 47+ min ago   (744+ words) For decades, the central obstacle to testing therapies that slow human aging has been painfully simple: aging takes decades to measure. A drug that genuinely delays the biological processes of aging would need years, often a lifetime, of follow-up before…...

5+ hour, 8+ min ago   (597+ words) The genomes of true frogs have long puzzled geneticists. Amphibians are famous for carrying some of the largest and most repetitive genomes among vertebrates, and yet the detailed architecture of their repetitive DNA has remained poorly explored compared with mammals,…...

7+ hour, 53+ min ago   (628+ words) A new open-source software package promises to transform how biologists hunt for the genetic switches that separate males from females in species with no reference genome....

8+ hour, 16+ min ago   (568+ words) Beneath the sun-baked soils of eastern and southern Africa, a family of rodents has quietly rewritten the rules of mammalian life. Naked mole-rats resist cancer, tolerate near-anoxic conditions and barely age. Damaraland mole-rats dig elaborate tunnel networks and live in…...

12+ hour, 51+ min ago   (695+ words) For nearly two decades, behavioural ecologists have been fascinated by the fact that animals are not simply bundles of independent traits. A bold individual tends to be an aggressive one; a curious animal often takes more risks. These consistent suites…...

21+ hour, 36+ min ago   (228+ words) A study involving 100 pairs of mice produced unexpected results that surprised researchers....

1+ day, 31+ min ago   (757+ words) Microtubules are among the most essential structures in any cell, hollow filaments built from α- and β-tubulin dimers that provide mechanical scaffolding, act as railways for intracellular transport, and form the spindle apparatus that segregates chromosomes during division. When the…...

1+ day, 8+ hour ago   (651+ words) Long-lived bats appear to combine powerful immune defenses with unusual strategies for eliminating damaged cells, potentially helping them avoid cancer and disease for decades. Researchers hope these genetic tricks could eventually reveal new ways to protect human health during aging....

1+ day, 20+ hour ago   (487+ words) As we age, blood stem cells, the essential source of new blood cells in the body, can accumulate genetic mutations. These mutations can give the cells a growth advantage, laying the foundation for developing serious health conditions. Now, scientists at…...

1+ day, 15+ hour ago   (1294+ words) In the mosses and lichens of the world – the in-between places, where living conditions rapidly fluctuate – lives a tiny animal with an extraordinary survival skill. No, not tardigrades – it's their much weirder housemate, the bdelloid rotifer. Just like tardigrades, bdelloid…...