Evolution
Desmids at High Res, and a Slight Technical Glitch
Yesterday I suffered a mysterious blog FAIL around 1 or 2 pm eastern time. Half of my post about desmids -- intricate, microscopic plants -- vanished within an hour or so of publication...
The Artful Amoeba
A Blog About the Weird Wonderfulness of Life on Earth
Evolution
Wonderful Things: Desmids, Microscopic Plants of Unusual Beauty and Oddball Behavior
Sometimes I want to show you something just because it's wonderful. So today I'm introducing a new feature: Wonderful Things. The name is taken from my blog's masthead, but is also inspired by Howard Carter...
The Sciences
Pirates, Charles Darwin, and One Very Un-Extinct Dodo
"Dodo Birds". Black and amber chalk on cream paper. By Roelandt Savery, ca. 1626. Public Domain; click for source Any animated film starring pirates, Charles Darwin, and a dodo is going to be worthy of mention here, but Aardman Animations -- of Wallace & Gromit and Chicken Run fame -- has outdone itself with "The Pirates!: Band of Misfits"...
Evolution
For Plants, Polyploidy Is Not a Four-Letter Word
The sacred Asian water lotus, Nelumbo nucifera -- the pedestal of choice for a variety of Egyptian and Indian deities. It's easy to see why. Public Domain.
The Sciences
Thank You, Domain Archaea ...
The Midway Geyser Basin at Yellowstone National Park, teeming with colorful archaea and bacteria. Creative Commons Wing-Chi Poon. Click image for license and source.
Evolution
Mosses Make Two Different Plants From the Same Genome, and a Single Gene Can Make the Difference
Two plants in one. Both are mosses, but they look wildly different. Creative Commons ndrwfgg. Click image for license and link. One of the most astonishing secrets in biology is this: every plant you see makes two different plants from the same genome...
Evolution
The Swimming Sea Cucumber and the Exploding Paint Pack
Sea cucumbers aren't all boring, trundling bags. Some of them swim -- and glow. Though I opted to focus on creatures found at greater depths in my last post, one of the creatures observed by the Deepsea Challenger expedition in the New Britain Trench at a relatively shallow 1000 meters was just such a swimming sea cucumber...
Evolution
Roots Down, Shoots Up. But How Does a Plant Know Which is Which?
From the Brockhaus and Efron Encyclopedic Dictionary. Credit: Wikimedia When an avalanche tears down a mountain, a revealing, if inadvertant, botanical experiment is sometimes begun...
Evolution
True-ish (and Hilarious) Facts About the Anglerfish
Anglerfish and comedy always seemed like a natural pairing. But it took internet humorist Ze Frank to bring the two together in one delicious dish. The natural history documentary parody series "True Facts About ..." by Frank has become a minor youtube sensation...
Evolution
What The World's Tiniest Free-Living Microbe Is Doing In You
Confused by what this might be? So were scientists for several hundred years. Apparently, the occupant of this contorted alder root also likes hanging out on your floor.
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