Evolution

The latest science on how life has adapted and changed over generations—and how new species come to be.

Latest in Evolution

Reconstruction of Hupehsuchus about to engulf a shoal of shrimp. The ancient lizard widely opens its skinny snout and large mouth to swallow a large ball of shrimp.
Environment

The planet’s first filter feeder could be this extinct marine reptile

By Laura Baisas

A Heliconius butterfly with black, orange, and white on its wings.
Environment

Butterflies can remember specific flower foraging routes

By Laura Baisas

An artist's rendition of the Perucetus colossus.
Science

This giant sea cow-like whale may have been the heaviest creature to ever live on Earth

By Sara Kiley Watson

Artistic reconstruction of a group of Burgessomedusa phasmiformis swimming in the Cambrian sea.
Environment

Jellyfish may have been roaming the seas for at least 500 million years

By Laura Baisas

A bee on a peach rose. Understanding how flowering plants and bees evolved together can help inform conservation efforts for pollinators and how to keep their populations healthy.
Environment

The world’s earliest bees may have called Gondwana home

By Laura Baisas

A scanning electron picture of a female Panagrolaimus kolymaensis nematode.
Environment

Recently awoken 46,000-year-old nematodes already have 100 generations of babies

By Laura Baisas

An artist’s impression of Solnhofia parsonsi’s environment in an Upper Jurassic lagoon 150 million years ago in what is now Lower Bavaria. The turtle swims in a shallow body of water, with fish swimming near it and pterosaurs flying above.
Environment

150 million-year-old turtle ‘pancake’ found in Germany

By Laura Baisas

Giganotosaurus vs. T. rex in a screenshot from Jurassic World Dominion
Science

Giganotosaurus vs. T. rex: Who would win in a battle of the big dinosaurs?

By Eva Botkin-Kowacki

parasitic horsehair worm
Science

‘Brainwashing’ parasites inherit a strange genetic gap

By Maddi Langweil

An artistic reconstruction showing how this 300,000 year-old stick would have been thrown on a hunt. Two men stand in a shallow body of water, with one aiming the stick towards three birds.
Science

A javelin-like stick shows early humans may have been keen woodworkers

By Laura Baisas

An artist’s illustration of Alligator munensis, which is skimming the water with its eye out and surrounded by lush green trees. The large tooth sockets towards the back of its mouth suggest this extinct gator could crush shells and may have snacked on hard-shelled prey like snails.
Environment

Extinct snub-nosed gator had big teeth for crushing snails

By Laura Baisas

A banded sea snake swimming freely
Environment

Some sea snakes may not be colorblind after all

By Laura Baisas

Oldest tunicate on record from the Cambrian explosion, illustrated on the ocean floor
Environment

A 500-million-year-old sea squirt is the evolutionary clue we need to understand our humble beginnings

By Maddi Langweil

A honey bee pollinates a yellow flower against a bright blue sky.
Science

Bee brains could teach robots to make split-second decisions

By Laura Baisas

Two male male rhesus macaques sit on the ground, one with his head down towards the other
Science

Same-sex mounting in male macaques can help them reproduce more successfully

By Laura Baisas

An illustration of Anomalocaris, which lived 541 million to 530 million years ago during the Cambrian Period. The animal has two bulging eyes on the top of its head and spiny front appendages,
Science

Ancient ‘weird shrimp from Canada’ used bizarre appendages to scarf up soft prey

By Laura Baisas

The silhouette of a female hunter with a bow and arrow at sunrise.
Science

Women have been skillful, purposeful hunters in most foraging societies

By Laura Baisas

A spider monkey stands on a tree branch with a baby monkey on her back.
Science

The ancestor of all placental mammals survived the dino-killing asteroid

By Laura Baisas

An orangutan sits in the forest and looks forward with its hands under its chin.
Environment

Orangutans can make two sounds at the same time

By Laura Baisas

An artist's illustration of a megalogon, which went extinct 3.6 million years ago and are believed to have grown to lengths of 50 feet.
Science

Megalodons were likely warm-blooded, despite being stone-cold killers

By Laura Baisas

A close-up of a katydid, an insect with six long and lean legs.
Environment

A 50-million-year-old insect testicle is one lucky find

By Laura Baisas

Close-up photos of three fossil animal specimens from the same area and time horizon as the fossil hominin tibia studied by the research team. These fossils show similar cut marks to those found on the hominin tibia studied. The photos show (a) an antelope mandible, (b) an antelope radius (lower front leg bone) and (c) a large mammal scapula (shoulder blade).
Science

Cut-up prehistoric bone raises questions about early human cannibalism

By Laura Baisas

An artist’s reconstruction of Olympicetus thalassodon pursuing a school of fishes alongside plotopterid birds (background) somewhere in the eastern North Pacific Ocean.
Environment

This dolphin ancestor looked like a cross between Flipper and Moby Dick

By Laura Baisas

Examples of engravings discovered in the Roche-Cotard cave (Indre et Loire - France). On the left, the "circular panel" (ogive-shaped tracings) and on the right the "wavy panel" (two contiguous tracings forming sinuous lines).
Science

Neanderthals were likely creating art 57,000 years ago

By Laura Baisas

A white Andalusian horse galloping in a field.
Science

Horses once had multiple hoofed toes

By Laura Baisas

Bite marks on Triassic fossils show signs of bloody dino decapitation
Science

Bite marks on Triassic fossils show signs of bloody dino decapitation

By Sara Kiley Watson

This extremely metal Cretaceous dinosaur grew blade-like armor
Science

This extremely metal Cretaceous dinosaur grew blade-like armor

By Sara Kiley Watson

Australian giant skink
Science

This chunky ancient lizard was 1,000 times bigger than its modern relatives

By Sara Kiley Watson

Two ants facing one another. Ants release a pheromone that helps other ants sense danger.
Environment

Ants brains are surprisingly good at communicating danger to others

By Laura Baisas

Lucy, our ancient human ancestor, was super buff
Science

Lucy, our ancient human ancestor, was super buff

By Sara Kiley Watson

single fruit fly
Environment

Flies age faster once they’ve seen death

By Sara Kiley Watson

Paramecium bursaria under a microscope. All creatures whose cells house a nucleus, including Paramecium bursaria, can be traced back to a common ancestor called the Last Eukaryotic Common Ancestor (LECA).
Science

Newfound single-celled hunters may have been Earth’s first-ever predators

By Laura Baisas

An illustration of the rhynchosaur Bentonyx from the Middle Triassic of Devon, about 245 million years ago.
Science

This ancient reptile had a deadly vegetarian diet

By Laura Baisas

The California two-spot octopus (Bimaculoides) is the first octopus species to have its genome sequenced and is very helpful for studying cephalopods.
Environment

Octopuses rewrite their own RNA to survive freezing temperatures

By Laura Baisas

A monkey laying on a tree smiling.
Environment

Super semen could be one reason why primates evolved to masturbate

By Laura Baisas

These species were discovered in museum collections. They might already be extinct.
Science

These species were discovered in museum collections. They might already be extinct.

By Katarina Zimmer / Undark

A mother and baby golden snub nosed monkey. These primates live in mountainous regions of southwestern China. Longer periods of maternal care may have helped them form more complex societies.
Environment

Chilly climates may have forged stronger social bonds in some primates

By Laura Baisas

Reassembled partial skeleton Ambulator keanei with silhouette demonstrating advanced adaptations for quadrupedal, graviportal walking.
Environment

This 500-pound Australian marsupial had feet made for walkin’

By Laura Baisas

A walker in sneakers, with the bottom of the shoe visible.
Health

Evolution of human foot arches put the necessary pep in our upright steps

By Laura Baisas

A sloth hangs in a tree in Costa Rica. The mammals have the slowest digestive system of any animal on Earth. It can take sloths two weeks to digest an entire meal, and they sleep about 20 hours a day to conserve energy.
Environment

Sloth schedules are surprisingly flexible

By Laura Baisas

A spiny mouse standing on a rock. Spiny mice can regenerate skin, muscle, nerves, spinal cord, and possibly cardiac tissue.
Environment

African spiny mouse joins a small but mighty group of bony plated mammals

By Laura Baisas

Siler collingwoodi is a colorful, ant-mimicking spider found in China and Japan.
Environment

This spider pretends to be an ant, but not well enough to avoid being eaten

By Laura Baisas

A blue butterfly on a pink flowering plant.
Environment

A ‘butterfly tree of life’ reveals the origins of these beautiful insects

By Laura Baisas

Extinct ‘thunder beasts’ went from mini to massive in the blink of an evolutionary eye
Environment

Extinct ‘thunder beasts’ went from mini to massive in the blink of an evolutionary eye

By Laura Baisas

A bat sea star on a dark background.
Environment

The blueprints for early organs may be hiding in sea stars

By Laura Baisas

The cast of a Neanderthal skull on display at the Chemnitz State Museum of Archaeology in Germany on January 24, 2023.
Science

How Neanderthal genetic material could influence nose shapes to this day

By Laura Baisas

Woolly mammoth tusks in dawn light on Wrangel Island, northeast Siberia, where the female mammoth tusk used in the testosterone study had been found several years earlier.
Environment

Male woolly mammoths had hormone-fueled bouts of aggression

By Laura Baisas

An illustration of the organisms that lived in the Castle Bank community.
Environment

Fossil trove in Wales is a 462-million-year-old world of wee sea creatures

By Laura Baisas

Red cherry shaped as butt on orange and purple ombre background
Science

A scientific exploration of big juicy butts

By Rachel Feltman

The oldest chili pepper specimen may be from present-day Colorado
Science

The oldest chili pepper specimen may be from present-day Colorado

By Sara Kiley Watson

How deadly amphibians survive their own poisons
Environment

How deadly amphibians survive their own poisons

By Geoffrey Giller/Knowable Magazine

An adult male and adult female California sea lion sit on a beach surrounded by pups.
Environment

Male California sea lions have gotten bigger and better at fighting

By Laura Baisas

Evolution of human brain size shown with brass sculptures at a kids science museum in China
Environment

We probably have big brains because we got lucky

By Jocelyn Solis-Moreira

Two mudskippers fighting in the mud, with eyes and pectoral fins exposed.
Environment

Mudskippers blink—and that’s a huge evolutionary clue

By Laura Baisas

A male chimpanzee named Frodo frowns.
Environment

Nice chimps finish last—so why aren’t all of them mean?

By Laura Baisas

A carnivorous Sarracenia plant growing in the wild.
Environment

Carnivorous pitcher plants may use tempting aromas to lure prey to their death

By Laura Baisas

Cannabis plant under purple weed grow light
Science

On 420, learn more about weed with these carefully cultivated science stories

By Jamie Dickman

An orb weaver spider spins a web in a forest.
Environment

Spider glue might evolve faster than the spiders themselves

By Laura Baisas

The mysterious ‘Tully monster’ didn’t have a spine after all
Science

The mysterious ‘Tully monster’ didn’t have a spine after all

By Jamie Dickman

An artistic rendering of the open woodland habitat reconstruction at Moroto II with Morotopithecus bishopi vertically climbing with infant on back and Mount Moroto, an active, in background.
Environment

A plant-based diet full of leaves may have helped apes stand upright

By Laura Baisas

Skeleton of paratype of Icaronycteris gunnelli, the oldest bat skeletons ever found.
Environment

Oldest bat skeleton ever found by paleontologists finally has a name

By Laura Baisas

Luna moth resting on a tree.
Science

The alluring tail of the Luna moth is surprisingly useless for finding a mate

By Jamie Dickman

Woolly mammoths evolved tiny ears over 700,000 years in Siberia
Environment

Woolly mammoths evolved tiny ears over 700,000 years in Siberia

By Laura Baisas

A purple hand reaching to touch a green tongue of an orange person with their mouth open frowning because they're tasting something digsuting
Science

Why food tastes wildly different to different people

By Julia Craven