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A unique life
(Science, 305: 39)
Evolutionary and systematic biologists around the world are gearing up to fête their most precious, if controversial, icon. On 5 July, Harvard professor emeritus Ernst Mayr celebrates the centenary year of a life devoted to evolutionary science...
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Rats tell Polynesian story
(Science, 304: 1742)
Tracing the origins of the Pacific Islanders is difficult: The DNA of modern Polynesians is too diluted for use, and tribal taboos prevent scientists from taking DNA samples from ancient remains...
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Borneo jungle vanishing
(Science, 303: 952)
Two new analyses of satellite images of Borneo have shown that deforestation in Kalimantan, the Indonesian two-thirds of the island, is progressing at a staggering rate, higher even than a pessimistic projection made by the World Bank....
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Forest ecologists go mega
(Science, 300: 1872)
British and Malaysian scientists and volunteers are planting 120,000 trees in the largest-ever experiment on the role of biodiversity in ecosystem function...
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Dutch ecology under attack
(Science, 292: 1055)
In a cost-saving move, Leiden University in the Netherlands has proposed excising five sections--including two internationally prominent research groups...
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Long-lost bird raises its head
(Science, 291: 2309)
Yet another reputedly 'extinct' species has made its reappearance on an island off New Guinea...
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Eating like a bird after bad grub
(Science, 285: 1845)
Eating one bad crabcake can put you off crabs for years. When it comes to miserable gut reactions, red-winged blackbirds are no different...
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Synchronised sex; how a jolt to the body clock can drive evolution (16 January 1999)
When the biological clocks of males and females are out of sync, their sex lives suffer. Or at least it does if they are melon flies, Japanese entomologists have found. They say that differences in daily rhythms might even promote the evolution of new species...
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A Paradox to Everyone but Himself
(September 2004)
Last month my students and I took a field trip to a small forest reserve a couple of miles from our university campus in Malaysian Borneo. Slip-sliding down a steep jungle path, clutching the soggy stems of wild yams in a futile attempt to stay upright, we collapsed into a pebbly streambed...
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Caution: species crossing
(September 2002)
What do you get if you cross a carrier pigeon with a woodpecker? Or a bear with a vampire? Riddles like these can be heard in schoolyards and at children's parties all over the world. Science fiction, too, employs hybrids...
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The unselfish genome--the case for cooperating genes
(December 2002-January 2003)
Ever heard of Demodex folliculorum, a 0.4-millimeter-long mite and a relative of the spiders? Probably not--but if you squint you can get a close-up of one of its preferred habitats. The eyelash mite, as it is more commonly known, lives on almost everybody's face...
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Too tired to be sexy
(16 December 2004)
SINGAPORE--Fears that escapee zebrafish, genetically engineered to glow in fluorescent color, would interbreed with their drab brethren in the wild, may be unfounded...
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Solo moms have fewer sons
(22 October 2004)
If the lottery from sperm and egg to baby were as fair as a flipped coin, the number of girls and boys born would be identical. But a new study reveals that having a dad around the house may increase the likelihood of boys being born...
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Why two sexes are better than one
(6 October 2004)
Step into a singles bar and it's pretty clear that having humanity divided up into two sexes can be frustrating--it cuts the potential mating pool in half. Biologists have long puzzled over why this should be...
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Evolution's no-fly zone
(22 September 2004)
Animal populations that become isolated by rivers and other geographic barriers often evolve into new species. So you might expect that wingless insects, which should have trouble surmounting such barriers, would be particularly prone...
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Insect police cracks down on slackers
(25 August 2004)
Like workaholic employees, worker bees, ants, and wasps give up families of their own for the good of the hive. But every company has its cheats, and some workers try to sneak eggs of their own into the queen's brood...
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Don't touch my toes
(12 August 2004)
Removing a unique combination of toes in frogs and toads is a common way for ecologists to ID individuals. Experimenters have assumed that this is harmless. But now, a study in the August issue of the Journal of Applied Ecology shows otherwise...
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Catching fish evolving
(2 August 2004)
The myriad of colorful cichlid fishes of the African Great Lakes is a classic example of explosive evolution, with thousands of species having appeared in the geological equivalent of a blink of an eye...
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What's your sign--Pisces?
(15 July 2004)
Even the best pickup line isn't any good if your potential mate doesn't hear it. So scientists have been puzzled that males of many species, including fish and frogs, send mating signals that a female has trouble perceiving...
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A good nose for ovulation
(18 June 2004)
A long-held belief among anthropologists is that there's no way to tell exactly when a human female is ovulating. Men hoping to catch her fertile phase, therefore, would have no option but to hang around--and not go gallivanting...
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Rats might redraw Polynesian immigration route
(8 June 2004)
Tracing the origins of the Pacific Islanders has been hampered by taboos against taking DNA samples from ancient remains. So rather than sampling human DNA, scientists have been studying DNA from the rats the ancient Polynesians carried everywhere they went...
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When east met west in Kazakhstan
(4 May 2004)
Central Asia has always been a thoroughfare for tribes migrating between East and West; that much scientists knew. But exactly when these movements took place, and how big they were, had been a matter of debate...
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That spider smells familiar
(29 March 2004)
If you're going to move into someone's house and eat their children, it pays to be discrete. Predators that live in ant colonies, called myrmecophiles, get away with this because they smell, look, and behave just like ants...
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Caribbean coral catastrophe
(26 March 2004)
In the early 1980s, staghorn corals in the Caribbean suddenly died off massively--and never recovered. Scientists have been divided over who was to blame: man or the vagaries of nature. Now, cores bored from a Jamaican reef seem to point the finger at man...
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Slip of the chameleon's tongue
(8 March 2004)
Chameleons' sticky tongues lash out at unsuspecting bugs with amazing speed. For almost a century, zoologists thought they had this feat of bioengineering figured out. But a new study shows they missed the most important bit...
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Sing a song to save the species
(24 February 2004)
Passing on genes is the bottom line in the game of life. So if you hand off your DNA to infertile kids, your evolutionary score plummets. Not surprisingly, animals have evolved all sorts of ways to make sure they mate successfully. Perhaps the sweetest sounding approach is that of European flycatchers...
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Borneo's Lost Logs
(12 February 2004)
If mention of Borneo still conjures up images of endless steamy rainforests in your imagination, a reality check may be in order. New analysis of satellite data, reported today in Science, shows that deforestation on the island is hurtling on faster...
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Lady guppies sniff out a mate
(10 February 2004)
Good looks are nothing to sniff at, but if you're a male guppy in a murky stream, your body odor may be more important for attracting mates. Evolutionary biologists thought the female guppy always chooses her mate by his vibrant colors and swinging tail...
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Jumping genes are fruit flies' saviors
(30 January 2004)
Most biologists might guess that transposons, viruslike bits of DNA that jump in and out of genomes, would harm their host. But new research shows that sometimes these genetic foes can turn into friends, by boosting toxin-busting genes...
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Rafflesia's genetic roots revealed
(6 January 2004)
Botanists have long been puzzled by the Rafflesia plant. Found only in the rainforests of Southeast Asia, it produces the largest flower in the world. But the lack of most organs normally used to classify plants has made it almost impossible to determine where it sits on the plant family tree...
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Orchid bees really suck
(12 December 2003)
Most bees use their tongues to lick nectar from flowers. But a new study shows that tropical orchid bees have opted out of a life of lapping and gone for sucking instead...
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Squeezing jumbo genes from ivory
(2 December 2003)
Although outlawed for almost 15 years, illegal trade in African elephant ivory is booming. But conservationists may now have a new weapon in their fight against poachers. Genetic testing of tusks can reveal their exact provenance...
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The race for solid semen
(24 November 2003)
Chimps are the most notorious swingers among the great apes. Their wanton sex lives, in which males compete to impregnate females, have led males to evolve huge testicles, three times the size of humans'...
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Flowers give beetles a warm welcome
(19 November 2003)
Cold-blooded critters like insects need to heat up their bodies before they can do much of anything. But whereas snakes and lizards lie in the sun, new research finds that some insects bask in the warmth of ... plants...
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Genes keep bee's brain on the job
(10 October 2003)
Ever feel like your mind is not on the job? You wouldn't if you were a honey bee. A new study in today's Science shows that the active genes in their brains accurately fit their job description: either nurse or forager...
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Climate change shifts flight schedules
(3 October 2003)
To inhabitants of the higher latitudes, the springtime arrival of migrant birds may seem as fixed as the celestial orbits. But a report published this week shows otherwise...
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Waterfowl ferry fauna
(16 September 2003)
The inside of a duck's intestine may not win any prizes for passenger satisfaction, but for freshwater fauna, it is the long-haul carrier of choice. That is the finding of research published in this month's issue of Global Ecology and Biogeography...
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Orangutan counts refined
(12 September 2003)
The orangutan, our closest relative after chimpanzees and gorillas, only lives in the lowland forests of Borneo and Sumatra, in Indonesia and Malaysia...
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Elephants in a league of their own
(21 August 2003)
Although Borneo is home to many animals found nowhere else in the world, the largest creature roaming its jungles, the Asian elephant, had always been dismissed as a descendant from domesticated animals brought in during colonial times...
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Fly genome warms to global change
(21 May 2003)
Although global warming may not yet have reached catastrophic proportions, its subtle effects can already be seen in the natural world. Butterflies, for example, are shifting their home ranges toward cooler areas...
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Underground fish back Darwin
(14 March 2003)
Blind, pale, and condemned to scraping a living deep underground, cave creatures have a repulsiveness akin to Tolkien's Gollum. Yet, they were among Darwin's favorites...
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Lizards' family values
(7 March 2003)
A spouse, a few children, a place under the sun, and plenty of juicy bugs for breakfast--that's the good life for the black rock skink. As reported in the March issue of Molecular Ecology, this Australian lizard has become the first known reptile to live in a 'nuclear family'...
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Why monkeys smell better than people
(28 February 2003)
Bomb-sniffing dogs at airports are living proof that the human species is olfactorily challenged. Even our fellow primates seem to have keener noses than we do. New genetic research shows why this is...
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Pitch-perfect frogs
(5 December 2002)
A concert of croaking male frogs is a fierce singing contest, and he who has the sexiest voice gets to mate the most. Now two ecologists working in Malaysia report on a tree frog that has taken this musical battle to a strategic extreme...
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The world's oldest genetic engineers
(28 May 2002)
Viruses may seem the scourge of the living world, hijacking organisms' genetic machineries for their own good and causing conditions from eczema to AIDS. But a family of wasps has turned these foes into friends...
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In earwigs, two penises are better than one
(26 November 2001)
The external body parts of animals frequently come in pairs, from legs to nostrils to antennae. As with every rule, of course, there are exceptions, and the penis is usually one of them...
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Lady in red
(22 October 2001)
Sperm is cheap and eggs are precious, the usual story goes. That's why, in the animal world, males tend to be promiscuous and females more discerning. As a consequence, males have evolved bright colors, ornate horns, absurd tails and other ornaments to strut their stuff...
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Molecular clocks not exactly Swiss
(28 September 2001)
How to tell the age of the extinct ancestor common to two living species? Take the same gene from both and count the differences in the DNA. Then divide it by the rate at which DNA mutates, and presto!...
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Slug sex shocker
(6 September 2001)
Sexual selection, which tends to favor animals that win many mates, has spiced up the world with stag antlers, cicada concertos, and other wonders. Biologists have long assumed that sexual selection is possible only with separate sexes...
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Snail sex improved by love dart
(6 July 2001)
During courtship, some would-be lovers shoot themselves in the foot. Some snails, however, shoot each other in the foot: As a bizarre sort of foreplay, they routinely insert long needles into one another...
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Bug makes mites transsexual
(29 June 2001)
All biology students learn that animals are diploid, carrying one set of chromosomes from their mother and one set from their father. In sperm and eggs, these double sets are halved to produce single, 'haploid' ones, which unite during fertilization...
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Bowerbirds, brainy birds
(10 April 2001)
As bird behavior goes, the displays of bowerbirds are among the weirdest. Male bowerbirds have taken up architecture to impress females, building large hutlike structures of twigs, decorated with shiny beetles, shells, and other colorful touches...
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Long-lost bird raises its head
(14 March 2001)
The leftovers of a pig hunter's supper have provided some good news for ornithologists: the Bruijn's Brush-Turkey probably still roams an island off New Guinea, even though it has not been seen alive for more than 60 years...
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Love me, love my scent
(8 March 2001)
If you thought you could hide your body odor under a generous splash of aftershave, you're kidding yourself. Two scientists have uncovered evidence that people pick perfumes that reflect the genetic make-ups of their immune systems...
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Say it with flowers
(2 March 2001)
The flowers of many kinds of orchid look and smell like female insects. This fools males into trying to mate with them, transferring pollen as they go along. But males only mount flowers that have not yet been pollinated...
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On the horns of a dilemma
(23 February 2001)
Male dung beetles are the Hell's Angels of the insect world. They're blundering beasts, covered in refuse, and they sport impressive prongs on their heads and shoulders...
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Malaria shows its soft spot
(1 February 2001)
An antibiotic that helps fight zits and bad breath may be able to prevent a much more serious disease. In the February issue of Nature Medicine, researchers report that triclosan, often used in mouthwash and acne creams, can cure mice of malaria...
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Don't eat me! I'm with those guys
(19 January 2001)
Müllerian mimicry is a classic example of evolution by natural selection:When two or more foul-tasting species share the same habitat, they tend to warn potential predators using the same colors...
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Plants eavesdrop on their neighbors
(31 October 2000)
When confronted with hordes of hungry herbivores, plants don't simply await the inevitable. A team of researchers has evidence that plants do the chemical equivalent of eavesdropping on their neighbor...
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Mysteries of sex remain
(17 October 2000)
Why does sex exist? After all, plenty of organisms, from dividing microbes to plants that grow from cuttings, do perfectly well without it. Although researchers can't say decisively what sex is for, they have ruled out one common explanation...
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In the jungle, the clumpy jungle
(26 May 2000)
Nineteenth-century naturalist and adventurer Alfred Russel Wallace noted how hard it is to find two trees of the same species in a tropical rainforest. Ever since, conventional wisdom among botanists has held that tropical trees are widely and randomly scattered...
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Wasps seek safety in numbers
(20 April 2000)
The family life of many wasp species is stable, highly organized, and utterly strange. Only the queen procreates, while chaste female kin seem content to look after her little ones...
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Your cheatin' germs
(7 April 2000)
Cheating isn't limited to kids in classrooms: Duplicitous behavior is common in many social animals, from ants to lions. Now a team of microbiologists says that cheating could even take place among the lowliest of social slime...
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Pesticides make birds skip meals
(9 September 1999)
Eating one bad crabcake can put you off crabs for years. When it comes to miserable gut reactions, red-winged blackbirds are no different, a new study shows...
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The ultimate underwater technicolor
(29 October 1999)
The world drips with color because the human eye has three types of so-called cone cells, which sense red, blue, and green light. But our vision is downright dull compared to that of the mantis shrimp...
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Blue tits don't mix with the neighbors
(1 September 1999)
Blue tits can be real homebodies. Flying in the face of conventional wisdom, two groups of these European birds living in close proximity stick to their own and have adapted to their surroundings...
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Beetles with a deadly aim
(18 August 1999)
Bombardier beetles are the gunslingers of the insect world. For centuries, these insects have been known for the explosive, boiling-hot discharges they release when harrassed...
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Swinging queens have best nests
(6 August 1999)
Wantonness is everywhere. From honeybees to humans, females often like to have their children fathered by more than one male. Biologists have always had little hard data on why this should be so...
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Butterflies beat retreat from heat
(10 June 1999)
Some people may think global warming is a myth, but butterflies seem to know better. In today's Nature, scientists report that many butterfly species have shifted their range northward by hundreds of kilometers...
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Plants that echo in the night
(29 April 1999)
Some tropical flowers don't just have loud colors, they are also loud--at least to bats. In today's Nature, researchers report that the flower of a Central American vine is shaped like a sound-reflecting mirror...
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Ants use biological pest control to protect food
(21 April 1999)
Nasty weeds in your garden? Take a tip from leaf-cutter ants. According to a paper in tomorrow's Nature, the famous symbiosis between some ants and their gardens of mold is made possible by bacteria...
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How to pick a rooster
(13 April 1999)
From stags to stag beetles, males try to seduce females with flashy antlers, crests or horns. The bigger the hood ornament, the hunkier the male--with, presumably, equally sturdy offspring...
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Clot-buster built from scratch
(1 April 1999)
After a heart attack or stroke, patients are often given a drug called heparin to prevent blood clots. Now scientists have assembled a synthetic abridged form of heparin...
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A six-legged smoke alarm
(25 March 1999)
Almost any animal in its right mind will flee a burning forest, but there is one insect that does the opposite. The jewel beetle Melanophila just loves a good fire...
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A greater alligator
(18 March 1999)
Weighing in at more than 5000 kilograms and equipped with Tyrannosaurus rex-sized teeth, Deinosuchus was not the sort of crocodile you would try to make a handbag out of...
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Splitting hairs to spot breast cancer
(3 March 1999)
High-power x-rays can diagnose breast cancer from a single hair, according to a report in tomorrow's Nature. Although the technique is simpler to interpret--and potentially more reliable than a mammogram, it requires a multimillion-dollar synchrotron facility...
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Wasp club for men
(11 February 1999)
TV remote control in one hand and a beer in the other, the classic picture of a man in his castle usually bears little resemblance to the female-dominated societies of bees, wasps and ants...
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Is the human genome going downhill?
(28 January 1999)
For millions of years, our genomes have been collecting mutations at an alarming rate, researchers write in today's issue of Nature. That begs an intriguing riddle...
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Promiscuity pays for bumblebees
(13 January 1999)
Planning to tell your children about the birds and the bees? Think twice. Queen bees are among the most wanton of animals, mating with up to 20 males on their wedding flight...
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Female flies decide sperm wars
(7 January 1999)
Love may seem like war sometimes, but within the reproductive tract of female fruit flies, a true battle rages: sperm from different male flies compete head-to-head for a chance to fertilize the precious eggs...
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Giants of the mountain
(17 August 2004)
Legend has it that a giant dragon dwells on the summit of Mount Kinabalu. Kinabalu, at 4,095 m the tallest peak in Southeast Asia, is climbed by thousands of hikers each year, and the dragon remains undiscovered...
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Treasure trove of snails
(27 January 2004)
With their jagged peaks, white cliffs, and deep caves, limestone hills are rare but awe-inspiring features of the landscape of Sabah. Although well-known for their bats, bird's nests, and also as historical burial sites, their biological significance is possibly at least as high...
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