Fruit fly larvae can taste ribonucleosides, the building blocks of gene transcripts, according to a new study publishing on August 7 in the open-access journal PLOS Biology by Hubert Amrein and Dushyant Mishra of Texas A&M Health Science Center and their colleagues. Moreover, the ability to detect ribonucleosides in the environment helps promote the rapid...
Hollow trees host massive moth slumber parties
Unlike social insects such as bees and ants, moths are generally loners. So, when Florida Museum of Natural History lepidopterist Andrei Sourakov spotted a dozen glossy black Idia moths inside a hollow tree, he made a mental note.
After he stumbled across 100 of the same species in another hollow tree, he knew he had picked...
Extinct vegetarian cave bear diet mystery unravelled
During the Late Pleistocene period (between 125,000 to 12,000 years ago) two bear species roamed Europe: omnivorous brown bears (Ursus arctos) and the extinct mostly vegetarian cave bear (Ursus spelaeus).
Until now, very little is known about the dietary evolution of the cave bear and how it became a vegetarian, as the fossils of the direct...
Animals can use muscle as an internal water source
Water is vital for life.
But as our climate changes, the availability of water is also changing, leaving animals with limited or unreliable supplies of this critical resource.
However, a new Arizona State University study published in the Royal Society journal Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences shows for the first time that animals may...
Mosquito screening useful in monitoring lymphatic filariasis re-emergence
To ensure elimination of the Wuchereria bancrofti, a parasitic roundworm that causes lymphatic filariasis, public health workers must follow up mass drug administration with careful monitoring for recurrence. To that end, a study published this week in PLOS Neglected Tropical Diseases analyzes the effectiveness of mosquito screening as a tool to gauge parasite presence.
The parasitic...
Changes to sperm's small RNA in the epididymis may help ensure mouse embryos implant
This week, Louise Brown, the first person born after conception by in vitro fertilization (IVF), celebrates her 40th birthday. Thanks to assisted reproductive technologies like IVF and intracytoplasmic sperm injection and to new techniques developed in laboratory animals, researchers are able to uncover new details about the processes of fertilization and reproduction in mammals. This...