Good science isn’t rooted in chance. It’s based on people with expertise being in the right place at the right time, equipped with enough knowledge to know what they’re looking at.
Mammals’ ancestors had a third eye and the fossil record of its disappearance tells us the story of the evolution of one of our most important features: warm blood.
An old technique to explore the inside of fossils unfortunately ended up destroying some unique specimens. New technology has been used to reconstruct one such fossil.
Modern sabre-tooth mammals have their canines constantly on display. This allows them to seduce mates. But was sexual selection also an important phenomenon among our pre-mammalian ancestors?
The Grampians, like much of Australia, has swung from Millennium Drought to Big Wet and back again, putting animal populations on a rollercoaster that could get worse as climate change bites.
Australia’s conservation laws presume that we can preserve everything in its natural state. But in a changing world, we’ll have to be more flexible than that.
Pandas are bears – but two million years ago they stopped eating meat. Their digestive systems have not yet adapted, though. Do upset stomachs make panda pregnancy more difficult?
Flying-foxes can cause conflict - just ask the people of Batemans Bay, NSW. But plans to disperse them won’t necessarily work without understanding these highly mobile animals’ behaviour.