Latest news with #species
Yahoo
14-07-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
'This Isn't Jurassic Park' New Doc Explores the Science Behind the 'De-Extinction' of Dire Wolves and Other Animals
Dire wolves, the canine companions from Game of Thrones and an extinct species of the real world, are back, but how did they make their return? A new documentary plans to reveal the scientific breakthroughs that made this "de-extinction" possible. De-Extinction premieres July 17 on Curiosity Stream, and PEOPLE has a first look at the trailer for the upcoming project. The trailer for the documentary opens with a discussion of the "biodiversity problem" facing the Earth — the threat of half the world's species going extinct by 2050. Some experts who spoke with De-Extinction believe the way to combat this potential crisis is to "dig into the past and bring some of these really important species back." Colossal Biosciences is pursuing this plan, having already revived the dire wolf using grey wolf DNA, and is working on projects to bring back the giant moa bird and other extinct animals. In the trailer, the woolly mammoth and Tasmanian tiger are also mentioned as candidates for "de-extinction." The documentary promises to do more than talk about animals from the past. According to De-Extinction, the film aims to show how scientists are bringing back bygone species, and discuss the ethical dilemmas emerging from the advancement of this new field. "This isn't Jurassic Park. It's real science and real stakes, which can be much messier than people think." John Cavanagh, the doc's executive producer, teased in a statement with PEOPLE. "This is an incredible breakthrough. Genetic research has let us understand evolution like never before. De-extinction captures the potential of this moment, showing how radical science could shape the future of life on Earth. But it's also a sobering look at what's at stake," he added. Never miss a story — sign up for to stay up-to-date on the best of what PEOPLE has to offer, from celebrity news to compelling human interest stories. De-Extinction will take viewers to labs around the world, where researchers are working on a variety of groundbreaking projects that they consider key to protecting the planet's biodiversity. To learn more about the science that seems straight out of science fiction, tune into De-Extinction available on Curiosity Stream starting July 17. Read the original article on People
Yahoo
14-07-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
'This Isn't Jurassic Park' New Doc Explores the Science Behind the 'De-Extinction' of Dire Wolves and Other Animals
Dire wolves, the canine companions from Game of Thrones and an extinct species of the real world, are back, but how did they make their return? A new documentary plans to reveal the scientific breakthroughs that made this "de-extinction" possible. De-Extinction premieres July 17 on Curiosity Stream, and PEOPLE has a first look at the trailer for the upcoming project. The trailer for the documentary opens with a discussion of the "biodiversity problem" facing the Earth — the threat of half the world's species going extinct by 2050. Some experts who spoke with De-Extinction believe the way to combat this potential crisis is to "dig into the past and bring some of these really important species back." Colossal Biosciences is pursuing this plan, having already revived the dire wolf using grey wolf DNA, and is working on projects to bring back the giant moa bird and other extinct animals. In the trailer, the woolly mammoth and Tasmanian tiger are also mentioned as candidates for "de-extinction." The documentary promises to do more than talk about animals from the past. According to De-Extinction, the film aims to show how scientists are bringing back bygone species, and discuss the ethical dilemmas emerging from the advancement of this new field. "This isn't Jurassic Park. It's real science and real stakes, which can be much messier than people think." John Cavanagh, the doc's executive producer, teased in a statement with PEOPLE. "This is an incredible breakthrough. Genetic research has let us understand evolution like never before. De-extinction captures the potential of this moment, showing how radical science could shape the future of life on Earth. But it's also a sobering look at what's at stake," he added. Never miss a story — sign up for to stay up-to-date on the best of what PEOPLE has to offer, from celebrity news to compelling human interest stories. De-Extinction will take viewers to labs around the world, where researchers are working on a variety of groundbreaking projects that they consider key to protecting the planet's biodiversity. To learn more about the science that seems straight out of science fiction, tune into De-Extinction available on Curiosity Stream starting July 17. Read the original article on People
Washington Post
08-07-2025
- Science
- Washington Post
Are ‘alpha males' a myth? For most primates, the answer is yes.
Observations of 'alpha male' behavior among apes — including some of humans' closest relatives in the animal kingdom — have helped shape the archetype of the dominant male into a controversial touchstone of modern culture. But a sweeping analysis of power dynamics between male and female primates confirms that the alpha male is in fact relatively rare across 121 species of primates, finding that sex-based hierarchies across the vast order are more fluid — and successfully contested more frequently — than was historically assumed.
Yahoo
06-07-2025
- General
- Yahoo
Hundreds of CT plants, animals named as having conservation needs. Why it's being talked about now.
Hundreds of native Connecticut species including birds, fish, and mammals are listed among those with the greatest conservation need, according to the newly released 2025 Connecticut Wildlife Action Plan. The plan, which has not yet been finalized, includes over 500 species listed as those with the greatest conservation needs, according to the state's Department of Energy and Environmental Protection. The draft includes several new additions like the bog turtle, a species that is listed as critically imperiled in the state. The updated list contains a total of 1,079 species having most important, very important and important conservation needs, officials said. These include 546 plant, 315 invertebrate, 45 fish, 17 amphibian, 18 reptile, 108 bird and 30 mammal species. A draft of the plan was released last week and is open for public comment until July 27, according to officials. See the list here. Since 2005, each state has been required by the federal government to create and submit an updated Wildlife Action Plan every 10 years. The plans serve as blueprints for wildlife conservation at the state level and include regional and national conservation goals, officials said. During the public comment period, anyone can provide feedback on the list of species and habitats in need of conservation, the types of actions they would be most interested in taking in their community or any other part of the plan, DEEP said. The plan helps identify 'species of greatest conservation need' as well as their affiliated habitats and the issues they face. Conservation actions and research needs are then prioritized to conserve these species and habitats. By identifying these priorities, states can better direct conservation, policy and research. When a state's wildlife action plan gets approved by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, various organizations can apply for federal funding to implement conservation actions outlined in the plan, according to officials. An approved state action plan makes a state eligible for funding through the State Wildlife Grants Program. 'State Wildlife Action Plans are revised every 10 years and are an important means of securing funding for nature conservation. Connecticut's Wildlife Action Plan engages many partner organizations and provides guidance and vision for protecting our wildlife and their habitats into the future,' DEEP's Bureau of Natural Resources said in a statement. The criteria for a species being listed as a Species of Greatest Conservation Need (SGCN) is that they also are state listed as threatened or endangered, vulnerable to threats based on their biological or habitat needs, low in abundance or limited in distribution, and currently showing declines in abundance or habitat, officials said. In addition, the 2025 plan includes a list of State Assessment Priority Species. SAPS are species that officials say the state needs more information on to understand their status, trends, level of conservation concern and whether or not they should be classified as SGCN. Hundreds of species are now listed as State Assessment Priority Species. DEEP officials said that species having a status of SGCN or SAPS does not provide a species with any legal protection but helps focus attention on vulnerable plants and animals, catalyze research on data-deficient species and guide conservation efforts. Ideally, strategic conservation efforts will help declining species recover before they meet criteria for being listed as threatened or endangered. 'A draft list of SGCN and SAPS for the 2025 revision was developed based on recommendations from CT's top wildlife and plant experts. We collected public input on that draft list during the spring of 2024,' DEEP said in a statement. Among the wildlife experts that helped form the list includes a group of researchers in the Department of Natural Resources and the Environment at the University of Connecticut, according to UConn Today. The UConn team is also developing a web-enabled plan with interactive resources for towns and community partners. Part of the work being done includes interactive maps and species profiles and is scheduled to be released later this year. For more information on the Connecticut Wildlife Action Plan, go to Stephen Underwood can be reached at sunderwood@
BBC News
04-07-2025
- Science
- BBC News
The body parts evolution still can't explain
Human testicles are much smaller, in proportion, to some of our primate cousins. Evolution can tell us why. But the size of other body parts is a little bit more of a mystery. The human body is a machine whose many parts – from the microscopic details of our cells to our limbs, eyes, liver and brain – have been assembled in fits and starts over the four billion years of our history. But scientists are still puzzling over why we evolved into this particular form. Why do humans uniquely have a chin, for example? And why, relative to body weight, is a human testicle triple the size of a gorilla's but a fifth that of a chimpanzee? As I show in my new book, The Tree of Life, we are still searching for the answers to many of these "why" questions. But we are starting to find answers to some of them. The story of evolution tells us how, starting from simple beginnings, each species was built – when each of the components that make a living creature was added to its blueprint. If we climb the evolutionary tree of life, we can follow a twisting path that visits the increasingly specialised branches that a species belongs to. We humans, for example, were animals before we became vertebrates; mammals before evolving into primates and so on. The groups of species we share each of these branches with reveal the order our body parts appeared in. A body and a gut (inventions of the animal branch) must have come before backbone and limbs (vertebrate branch); milk and hair (mammals) came before fingernails (primates). There is a way we can study the separate problem of just why we evolved each of these body parts, but it only works if the feature in question has evolved more than once on separate branches of the tree of life. This repeated evolution is called convergence. It can be a source of frustration for biologists because it confuses us as to how species are related. Swallows and swifts, for example, were once classified as sister species. We now know from both DNA and comparisons of their skeletons that swallows are really closer relatives of owls than swifts. Size matters when it comes to evolution But convergent evolution becomes something useful when we think of it as a kind of natural experiment. The size of primate testicles gives us a classic example. Abyssinian black and white colobus monkey and bonnet macaque adult males are roughly the same size. But, like chimps, humans and gorillas, these similar monkeys have vastly dissimilar testicles. Colobus testicles weigh just 3g (0.1oz). The testicles of the macaques, in contrast, are a whopping 48g (1.7oz). You could come up with several believable explanations for their different testicle sizes. Large testicles might be the equivalent of the peacock's tail, not useful per se but attractive to females. But perhaps the most plausible explanation relates to the way they mate. A male colobus monkey competes ferociously for access to a harem of females who will mate exclusively with him. Macaques, on the other hand live in peaceful mixed troops of about 30 monkeys and have a different approach to love where everyone mates with everyone else: males with multiple females (polygamy) and females with multiple males (polyandry). The colobus with his harem can get away with producing a bare minimum of sperm – if a droplet is enough to produce a baby, then why make more? For a male macaque the competition to reproduce happens in a battle between his sperm and the sperm of other males who mated before or after. A male macaque with large testicles should make more sperm, giving him a higher chance of passing on his genes. It's a sensible explanation for their different testicle sizes, but is it true? This is where convergent evolution helps. If we look across the whole of the mammal branch of the tree of life we find there are many groups of mammals that have evolved testicles of all different sizes. In almost all these separate cases, larger testicles are consistently found in promiscuous species and smaller in monogamous. A small-testicled, silverback male gorilla has sole access to a harem. Big-testicled chimps and bonobos are indeed highly promiscuous. Dolphins, meanwhile, may have the biggest mammalian testicles of all, making up as much as 4% of their body weight (equivalent to human testicles weighing roughly 3kg (9.9lb)). Although wild dolphins' sex lives are naturally hard to study, spinner dolphins at least fit our expectations, engaging in mass mating events called wuzzles. It was thanks to the multiple observations provided by convergent evolution that we were able to discover this consistent correlation between testicle size and sex life right across the mammals. And as for humans, we have testicle size somewhere in the middle – you can make of this what you want! But what of the human chin? More like this:• When it comes to our brains, size isn't everything• How dinosaurs reached 'titanic' size• How humans lost their fur The human chin has been fertile ground for arguments between scientists over its purpose. As with testicles, there are half a dozen plausible ideas to explain the evolution of the human chin. It could have evolved to strengthen the jaw of a battling caveman. Maybe the chin evolved to exaggerate the magnificence of a manly beard. It might even be a by-product of the invention of cooking and the softer food it produced – a functionless facial promontory left behind by the receding tide of a weakening jaw. Intriguingly, however, a chin can be found in no other mammal, not even our closest cousins the Neanderthals. Thanks to the uniqueness of the Homo sapiens chin, while we have a rich set of possible explanations for its evolutionary purpose, in the absence of convergent evolution, we have no sensible way of testing them. Some parts of human nature may be destined to remain a mystery. * Max Telford is the Jodrell Professor of Zoology and Comparative Anatomy, at University College London ** This article is adapted from a piece that originally appeared on The Conversation, and is republished under a Creative Commons licence. -- For more science, technology, environment and health stories from the BBC, follow us on Facebook, X and Instagram.
