A study of fossilized lampreys dating from more than 300 million years ago is challenging a long-held theory about the evolutionary origin of vertebrates. These ancient, jawless, eel-like fishes arose ...

Whole-genome duplications are rare evolutionary events in which all the chromosomes and genes of a species are doubled. This supplies new genetic material to the gene pool and can provide an ...

A new study, led by the University of Vienna and the Alfred Wegener Institute in Bremerhaven, shows how the eyes of adult marine bristleworms continue to grow throughout life – driven by a ring of ...

Researchers report February 15 in the journal Cell that ancient viruses may be to thank for myelin—and, by extension, our large, complex brains. The team found that a retrovirus-derived genetic ...

The fossilized skull of Coccocephalus wildi, an early ray-finned fish that swam in an estuary 319 million years ago. The fish is facing to the right, with the jaws visible in the lower right portion ...

A biological wonder lives in the leaf litter of the dry forests of the Dominican Republic; the Jaragua Dwarf Gecko ...

A new study, led by the University of Vienna and the Alfred Wegener Institute in Bremerhaven, shows how the eyes of adult marine bristleworms continue to grow throughout life—driven by a ring of ...

"In vertebrate examples of life-long growth as fishes and amphibians – such stem cells supply the eye with fresh retinal neurons while the animal develops," explains senior author Florian Raible, ...