Smart slime
The single-celled slime mold Physarum polycephalum has a memory, and makes smart decisions, yet lacks a central nervous system.
design-features
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Tremendous trilobites
Amazing eyes show amazing design and confound evolution
The magnificent ‘flying’ frog
Whether gliding or parachuting, these forest frogs are adapted to the air
Sounding off on evolution
Does evolution give a sound explanation for the arrival of acoustics? They say the earth was mostly quiet for billions of years, but is that an argument from silence?
How cells handle heme
Recent discoveries about heme pose problems for evolutionary theory
Photographing God’s creation
Wilderness adventurer and photographer Bill Boehm tells how nature reveals its creator
Newly discovered jumping beetle mechanism inspires bionic design
Accident and adaptation, or divine design?
Shrimp eye design
The shrimp eye has an intricately structured reflective layer to focus light. Engineers would like to be able to copy the structure.
Pinnipeds
Fascinating creatures that thwart evolution
Tooth enamel: hard, and hard to replace
It’s the hardest substance in the human body. But be warned: If you’re slack with your dental hygiene, fixing your tooth enamel ain’t easy.
The history of flying machines
What does it tell us about the evolution of flight?
Over-engineering in nature: an evolutionary conundrum
Natural selection can only select for the attributes an organism needs to survive, so how is it that creatures are endowed with a whole lot more than necessary?