Evolution

Aliens in our midst

The ctenophore’s brain suggests that, if evolution began again, intelligence would re-emerge because nature repeats itself

Douglas Fox

From egg to the air: 21 days of bee development condensed into one mesmerising minute

1 minutes

In 1938, a fish thought extinct for 65 million years resurfaced, nearly unchanged

7 minutes

Flashing together: when fireflies meet LEDs, the result is a beautiful lightshow

2 minutes

Watch as the whale becomes itself: slowly, slowly, from land to sea, through deep time

10 minutes

The eerie otherworldliness of slow undersea life sped up to a human pace

5 minutes

Slime trails and ‘love darts’ – on the strange, slow skirmishes of snail sex

4 minutes

What the spitting archerfish might tell us about small-brain intelligence

4 minutes

A cut-throat case of evolutionary backstabbing in the Peruvian rainforest

3 minutes

What say you, dinosaur?

Did Neanderthals speak? Did dinosaurs roar? And when did birds begin to sing? The soundscape of deep time is coming back

Alex Riley

How the mantis shrimp’s six-pupiled eyes put 20/20 vision to shame

4 minutes

Obsession and electricity: a scientist chases the origins of life in the lab

16 minutes

Wild thing

How and why did humans domesticate animals – and what might this tell us about the future of our own species?

Jacob Mikanowski

Coded vibrations and signal jamming – the secret language of the treehoppers

5 minutes

Unified theory of evolution

Darwin’s theory that natural selection drives evolution is incomplete without input from evolution’s anti-hero: Lamarck

Michael Skinner

If a sea urchin survives the incredible tumult of youth, it’s nearly immortal

3 minutes

Glow worms mimic stars, creating a stunning faux night sky in a New Zealand cave

4 minutes

Extinction is forever: de-extinction can’t save what we had

Brian Switek

Anthropology is far from licking the problem of fossil ages

Paige Madison

The link between language and cognition is a red herring

Frans de Waal

What makes mosquitoes so good at getting under our skin?

3 minutes

Sex is a costly molecular kind of wizardry – why evolve it?

Arunas L Radzvilavicius

Great for killing, and for research: the lethal fangs of saber-toothed cats

5 minutes

How multicoloured side-blotched lizards put game theory into evolutionary action

3 minutes

How lobsters use their 12 ‘noses’ to woo mates, find food and win fights

5 minutes

Dogs love to play, but they don’t do so for pleasure

Raymond Coppinger & Mark Feinstein