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.
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.
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.
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.
Vera Weisbecker, Flinders University and Jeroen Smaers, Stony Brook University (The State University of New York)
Some animals, such as California sea lions, have small brains relative to their body size, but are still impressively intelligent, showing brain evolution is even more complex than it appears.