How have snakes evolved venom fangs so many times in their evolutionary history? Research suggests it’s due to a structure called ‘plicidentine’ in their teeth that can evolve into venom grooves.
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Articles on Evolution
Displaying 221 - 240 of 987 articles
It’s not just issues like climate change and vaccines that pose problems for conservative thinkers – it’s the way science itself is conducted.
A wide range of animals seem to have a grasp of numbers – but humans hold the trump card.
They can open jars, use tools, remember instructions and attack on command. But they’re still not the smartest cephalopod in the sea…
Warm-blooded fish can swim 1.6 times faster than their cold-blooded relatives.
Both men and women play a role in perpetuating attitudes toward sex that are hypocritical and logically inconsistent.
Jackals appeared and established themselves in Africa in at least the last five million years. These animals have evolved and adapted to the changing environment, allowing them to survive.
The sexual selection of larger males may be driven by an abundance – not a scarcity – of females.
Ophiojura, discovered living on a seamount deep in the Pacific Ocean, is the last known survivor of a unique group of animals that diverged from its closest relatives way back in the Jurassic period.
This is a crucial dinosaur for palaeontologists; the variety of fossils available means researchers can study the species’ growth through its whole life span.
Two tongue tips are better than one – an evolutionary biologist explains why snakes have forked tongues.
Gunggamarandu maunala is the first Australian croc discovered from a group called the tomistomines. And its prehistoric presence in modern-day Queensland means there could be more discoveries to come.
During mating season, a male turtle-headed sea snake will often lose sight of the female before mating can happen. The female may be metres away, but the male won’t ever find her again.
Tilly Edinger was the first person to apply a deep-time perspective into different species’ brain evolution. She did this by focusing on the hollow space within a dead animal’s skull.
Evolutionary medicine uses our ancestral history to explain disease prevalence and inform care for conditions like Type 2 diabetes. It also challenges the bio-ethnocentrism of western medicine.
Some snakes have tough, blunt fangs for cracking crabs. Others have sharp needles for getting a grip on mice.
We studied people’s brains while they held tools correctly and incorrectly.
New research combines cutting-edge engineering with animal behaviour to explain the origins of efficient swimming in nature’s underwater acrobats: seals and sea lions.
The utopian 20th-century model of a modern city – one that has been replicated around the world – is being exposed as unsuitable for adapting to the pace of change in the 21st century.
Burials seem to have been uncommon in Africa some 80,000 years ago, although they were widespread in Eurasia.
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Top contributors
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Strategic Professor in Palaeontology, Flinders University
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Scientia Professor of Evolutionary Ecology; Academic Lead of UNSW's Grand Challenges Program, UNSW Sydney
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Professor in Evolutionary Biology (jointly appointed with South Australian Museum), Flinders University
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Honorary Associate Professor, UNSW Sydney
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Senior Lecturer in Paleontology and Evolutionary Biology, Life Sciences at the University of Bath, University of Bath
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Professor of Evolutionary Palaeobiology at the Milner Centre for Evolution, University of Bath
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Associate Professor, Department of Physiology, Monash University
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Senior Researcher in Vertebrate Palaeontology, University of the Witwatersrand
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Adjunct Research Associate, Monash University
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Jenny Graves is a Friend of The Conversation.
Distinguished Professor of Genetics and Vice Chancellor's Fellow, La Trobe University
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Principal Lecturer in Wildlife Conservation, Nottingham Trent University
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Mark Elgar is a Friend of The Conversation.
Professor of Evolutionary Biology, The University of Melbourne
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Professor of Natural Sciences, UCL
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Senior lecturer, School of Biological Sciences, University of Bristol, University of Bristol
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Postdoctoral Research Fellow in Evolutionary Ecology, Griffith University
