Animals & Plants

Genome of the apple laid bare

One of the world's most popular fruits, the apple, has been genetically sequenced, an exploit that could lead to crisper, juicier and more flavoursome harvests, says scientists.

Bat Species Uses Stealth Technique to Capture Prey

A rare British bat has developed remarkable stealth technology to sneak up on moths.

Dogs, Rodents May Prevent Future Epidemics

If you have the flu, you may look sick to a human, but these disease-detecting animals can actually smell illness.

Bananas Get Pepper Power

A ruinous banana bacteria in Africa gets the shaft when two green pepper genes are inserted into bananas.

Can Cloned Plants Live Forever?

Despite the many cosmetic products, surgical treatments, food supplements, and drugs designed specifically to reverse the biological effects of aging in humans, long-lived aspen clones aren't so lucky.

Tiny Creatures Are Ocean's 'Vacuum Cleaners'

Salps can exist as a single individual or chains of 100 or more, shown here drifting through the twilight mid-ocean waters with a small fish. Credit: Kelly Sutherland and Larry Madin, WHOI.

Common Orchid Gives Scientists Hope in Face of Climate Change

A study led by scientists from the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew's Jodrell Laboratory, which focuses on epigenetics in European common marsh orchids, has revealed that some plants may be able to adapt more quickly to environmental change than previously thought. The research, published in Molecular Biology and Evolution, brings new hope to plant conservation.

Potato genes used to fend off cotton pests

Plants such as potato and tobacco have pest-killing genes that could help protect cotton, say Australian researchers.

Climate change could destroy 80 per cent of rainforest by next century

Fewer than one in five of the plants and animals which currently live in the world's rainforests will still be here in 90 years time, a study predicts.

'Most ancient' species is alive and well in Scotland

A rare shrimp that may be the most ancient animal species on Earth is alive and well in Scotland, scientists have discovered.

Student invents the 'intelligent' plant pot that lights up when it needs watering

By the time an ailing house plant sends out a distress signal, it is usually too late.

Ocean's food source disappearing: study

In oceans around the world, there has been a surprisingly large and extensive decline in phytoplankton - the tiny algae that keep marine food webs afloat.

White Eyes, Foot-Wide Flowers, Maroon Plants: Researcher Creating Unique Winter-Hardy Hibiscuses

With a little cross-breeding and some determination, Dr. Dariusz Malinowski, Texas AgriLife Research plant physiologist and forage agronomist in Vernon, is trying to add more colors to the world of hibiscuses.

What Causes Hybrid Vigor? Researchers Find Genetic 'Noise' Caused by Surprising Variation in Gene Activity

Plant scientists at the John Innes Centre have provided a new solution to an old debate on why species hybrids can be more vigourous than their parents.

Climate change causes larger, more plentiful marmots, study shows

This week, one of the world's foremost scientific journals will publish results of a decades-long research project founded at the University of Kansas showing that mountain rodents called marmots are growing larger, healthier and more plentiful in response to climate change.