Biology (Page 2)

A guide to life, on Earth and beyond, including the top news about plants, animals, and physiology.

Latest in Biology

three blue-green eggs in a nest sitting in a tree

10 wild photos of bird eggs

By Popular Science Team

a close up of a baby chick

Baby chicks like gentle pets—like really gentle

By Margherita Bassi

Close up of braces on Hispanic boy's teeth. He's wearing a blue collared shirt and there's light streaming in behind him. All we see is the bottom of his nose and chin.

Ancient humans didn’t need braces. So why do we?

By Popular Science Team

frog eggs floating on a pond. they are clear blobs with a black dot inside

Nature’s strangest eggs—from spongy clusters to gelatinous blobs

By Laura Baisas

Fish climbing upstream against rock wall

These tiny fish climb waterfall cliffs for 10 hours

The talons of an immature bald eagle.

Rescued birds treated to a pedicure—or talon trim

By Margherita Bassi

an illustration of a prehistoric spider relative

500-million-year-old spider relative has claws where it shouldn’t

By Laura Baisas

a baby squirrel with brown fur sits on a man's shoulder

Baby squirrels are here! Here’s what to do if you find one.

By Margherita Bassi

a smiling man in a yellow hooded sweatshirt wears a virtual reality headset over his eyes

Skull vibrations could be your next password

By Laura Baisas

24 new species of deep sea organisms. they are small and resemble shrimp

New crustacean named after its unique butt

By Laura Baisas

Healthcare, hand and iv with a patient in a hospital bed for recovery or rehabilitation closeup. Medical, wellness and treatment with a sick person lying in a clinic on a saline solution drip.

Parasitic sleeping sickness creates ‘invisibility cloak’ to hide in humans for years

a close up of a tortoise covered in dirt

Volunteers finally find Betty White—the rescue tortoise

By Laura Baisas

two owls sit on a metal table with their wings up

Spunky baby owls examined after being found on soccer field

By Laura Baisas

Illustration of Neanderthal tribe butchering large elephant near lake

Neanderthals hunted giant elephants in Europe

a bird with long legs and green feathers standing on a rock

Student discovers new Galápagos bird, solving a decades-old mystery

By Laura Baisas

A tight, candid close-up captures three Black men of different generations leaning their heads together in shared laughter. The man in the center is older with a grey beard, flanked by two younger men. All three have their eyes closed or squinted with joy, showcasing genuine, broad smiles and visible teeth. The image has a warm, intimate feel, emphasizing a strong emotional connection.

Why is laughter contagious? Blame your brain.

By Clarissa Brincat

An artist’s interpretation of mammals that lived during the last Ice Age. Fossils from similar species of an armadillo-like pampathere (bottom left) and giant ground sloth (background) were among those found in a recent study of a Texas water cave. Credit: Adapted from artwork by Jaime Chirinos

Giant armadillo, mastodon, and sloth fossils found in flooded Texas cave

a sperm whale calf swims under its mother

Baby sperm whale birth captured in groundbreaking video

By Laura Baisas

Illustration of sperm cells around egg

Sperm loses its sense of direction in space

Nine blue dots on purple background

How many blue dots do you see? New optical illusion tricks the brain.

One of the dogs sampled in the paper from the Skateholm site in Sweden, buried alongside a human.

Europe’s first domesticated dogs arrived over 3,000 years earlier than we thought

By Laura Baisas

a stylized photo of a woman sleeping

Vivid dreams trick your brain into thinking you slept well

By Laura Baisas

a herd of bison running by a car

What to do if you encounter a bison

By Laura Baisas

Red tulips blooming in the tulip fields in the northern Netherlands. Tulips rely on increasing temperatures to know when to bloom.

How plants know when to bloom

By Laura Baisas

A sperm whale and a photographer in the Atlantic Ocean near Portugal.

First-of-its-kind video confirms sperm whales really do headbutt

By Laura Baisas

a green insect (left) the same insect, but it has changed to pink (right)

Green insect turns a puzzling shade of hot pink

By Nidhi Sharma

a larger brown-ish sea turtle sits on an exam table

Hello Helvetica! Vets name rescued sea turtles named after fonts

By Nidhi Sharma

a postage stamp with a bison on it

New stamp honors Yellowstone’s iconic bison

By Nidhi Sharma

two mating frogs with the male grasping on to the female

Even humans love a good mating call

By Laura Baisas

a coyote pup with brown fur tilts its head

Coyote pupping season is here. You can help keep them safe.

By Laura Baisas

Cute labradoodle puppy dog laying down looking sad or thoughtful

Cockapoos, doodles, and other crossbreeds have behavioral problems, too

The bark of birch trees has been used to produce tar for more than 150,000 years. The center photo shows birch bark tar condensed onto a rock that borders a hearth. When scraped off the rocks, the viscous tar can be used as both an adhesive and antibiotic.

Neanderthals used antibiotics, new experiment suggests

By Laura Baisas

Adult bull shark ‘Chunky’ (foreground) parallel swimming with subadult female ‘Lady Lazarus’ (background).

Bull sharks make ‘friends’—and prefer females to males

By Laura Baisas

An adult male blue crab attempts to cannibalize a smaller blue crab on a tether.

Blue crabs have a serious cannibalism problem

By Laura Baisas

a blue whale swimming

Marine biologists spot rare blue whales off Massachusetts coast

By Margherita Bassi

A conceptual photograph of a young woman with light-colored hair and a tattoo on her forearm, wearing a white t-shirt against a plain white background. The image uses a multiple-exposure effect to create several overlapping, translucent silhouettes of her figure, conveying a sense of disorientation, dizziness, or blurred vision. She has a pained or nauseated facial expression and is resting her head against her hand.

Why some people get motion sickness—and others don’t

By Laura Kiniry

a bird chick sits on a nest

The world’s oldest wild bird has a new grandchick

By Margherita Bassi

several birds flying overhead while a bird sits on its nest with a chick

11 wild photos show the Amazon River in its glory

By Popular Science Team

A wolf chases magpies and ravens from an elk carcass near Soda Butte.

Yellowstone’s ravens may memorize wolf hunting hotspots—to feast

By Nidhi Sharma

A close-up photograph of a Halobates, an ocean water strider, resting on the surface of the water. The insect has a long, slender dark body and very thin, wire-like legs that create slight indentations on the water's surface tension. Its reflection is visible on the surface, and the background is a soft, out-of-focus light blue and white.

Do any bugs live in the ocean? Short answer: Not really.

By Andrew Coletti

Illustration showing ancient hominid drinking water at river's edge with crocodile lurking nearby in the water

An odd-nosed crocodile ate our prehistoric ancestors

a screenshot of a website showing a human brain, heart, colon, lung, kidney, prostate, placenta, and liver

Explore the human body in stunning, 3D detail with a new online tool

By Laura Baisas

a grizzly bear stands on a bison carcass

Yellowstone’s first grizzly bear of 2026 emerges from his den

By Laura Baisas

A close-up photograph of a young child with blonde hair smiling broadly, revealing several missing front baby teeth. The child is playfully covering their eyes with both hands, with a plain grey wall in the background.

Why do we even have baby teeth?

By Sarah Lindenfeld Hall

Scientists suggest modifying cars to hit fewer hedgehogs

By Margherita Bassi

A newly described African species in the magic mushroom family confirms its evolutionary origin. Psilocybe ochraceocentrata is found growing on cattle dung in the grasslands of southern Africa and Zimbabwe.

New psychedelic fungus rewrites origins of magic mushrooms

An Ixodes tick (left). An Asian tiger mosquito. (right)

What a cold winter means for ticks and mosquitoes

By Laura Baisas

a black bird sits on a tree

These birds listen to their parents to avoid being eaten

By Margherita Bassi

Two photos next to each other. One is a man laying on grass next to longest snake in the world for scale reference. The other is a with portion of the world's longest snake draped over his shoulder in the jungle

Longest snake ever measured is over 23.5 feet long

a turtle wearing a 3D printed wheel chair

A 3D-printed wheelchair is helping this turtle walk again

By Mack DeGeurin

yellow flowers blooming near hills

Best superbloom since 2016 fills Death Valley with wildflowers

By Laura Baisas

trees and shrubs are surrounded by a bright yellow weed

Weed that smells like paint thinner takes over Arizona

By Laura Baisas

purple crystals

Humans’ love of crystals goes back at least 6 million years

By Laura Baisas

Illustration showing Tanyka amnicola in life, eating underwater plants.

Bizarro salamander ancestor was an evolutionary oddball

Screenshot of final boss from original Doom

Computer run on human brain cells learned to play ‘Doom’

a horse standing in a green field with its mouth open

Horse whinnies are weirder than they sound

By Margherita Bassi

a woman holds a large lizard. it has black and white scales and is sticking out a red tongue tipped black

Frostbitten lizard found in Rhode Island is healing

By Margherita Bassi

Two dogs sitting in half open door looking curiously to the left

Dogs act like toddlers when trying to help humans

a polar bear mother closes her eyes while laying down with two cubs. one cub is biting the other's cheek

11 cool photos to celebrate International Polar Bear Day

By Popular Science Team

a large goat with grey fur and large horns

Ireland’s native goats date back to Bronze Age

By Laura Baisas

Close-up of aedes aegypti mosquito sucking blood from human skin, transmitting dangerous diseases like dengue fever, zika virus, and chikungunya, Chumphon in thailand.

Mosquitoes have been sucking our blood for 1.8 million years

green spruce needless with blue halos on top

Leaf tips glow blue in thunderstorms

By Laura Baisas

a dolphin swims in venice, italy

Humans pose the biggest risk to Venice’s celebrity dolphin

By Laura Baisas

a chimpanzee laying on its back in a forest

Chimpanzees love alcohol and their pee proves it

By Laura Baisas