A massive new whale discovered in the Peruvian desert presents a caloric quandary: At somewhere between 170,000 and 680,000 pounds, it would have required an equally massive diet to survive. Yet, Perucetus colossus was a slow, ponderous sort of sea creature that kept to the shallows and coastal regions.So, what did it do?Like many modern whales, it may have relied on filter feeding, or it may have munched on sea grass like a manatee. Or it could have suctioned up demersal fishes, crustaceans, mo ...read more

In medical and engineering circles, it’s known by a few different names: cabinet respirator, tank respirator, negative pressure ventilator and others. But since its creation almost a century ago, this lifesaving device has been known almost universally by another name: the iron lung.What Is an Iron Lung?As intimidating as the name sounds — and as scary as the coffin-like device looked — the iron lung was a medical miracle for people suffering from something even scarier: poliomyelitis. Bef ...read more

In the Early Triassic period, about 248 million years ago, the Hupehsuchus, an ancient tiny marine reptile, filter-fed its way through the early oceans. Paleontologists made the discovery after uncovering two intact Hupehsuchus nanchangensis skull specimens in a recent study published in BMC Ecology and Evolution. The find makes it the first marine filter-feeder that appeared after Earth’s biggest mass extinction. An Ancient Marine ReptileThe Hupehsuchus is a type of ichthyosauromorph with pa ...read more

For nearly 3,000 years, Egypt was ruled by a procession of pharaohs, starting with the Old Kingdom in 2,700 B.C., then the Middle Kingdom and culminating with the New Kingdom, which lasted until 1070 B.C. For the most part, these were absolute monarchs whose power was considered divine.Dynasties passed from one ruler to another with infighting and inbreeding a plenty. It was not an easy time to be atop the throne. But a few rulers stood above the rest. 1. Khnum Khufu (2589 B.C. – 2566 B.C.) ...read more

Days come and go. Our circadian rhythms are tuned to the rising and setting of the Sun and the push and pull of the Moon. Days appear stable to us, an endless cycle of day and night, unless we decide to change our clocks, there are always 24 hours in a day.However, change is the norm when it comes to Earth's day length over geological periods. Earth's satellite, our Moon, steals rotational energy to travel farther and farther away from us over time. And as the Moon's gravitational effect on the ...read more

A few years ago, I had the opportunity to go on safari in southern Africa. One of the greatest thrills was going out at night looking for predators on the prowl: lions, leopards, hyenas.As we drove through the darkness, though, our spotlight occasionally lit up a smaller hunter – a slender, tawny feline, faintly spotted or striped. The glare would catch the small cat for a moment before it darted back into the shadows.Based on its size and appearance, I initially presumed it was someone’s pe ...read more

One of the great achievements of modern science was the human genome project to map the sequence of genes in human DNA. The project produced unprecedented insight into the function of genes, their role in human health and the nature of life itself.And yet the human genome project was just the beginning. Armed with the sequence of genes in DNA, life scientists now want to know how the extraordinarily rich complexity of life emerges from this code. Closely linked and just as puzzling is how small ...read more

A 200-million-year-old piece of fossilized poop has provided some of the earliest evidence yet that modern-day parasites plagued the age of the dinosaurs.A Thai-French joint paleological survey recovered the “coprolite” in 2010 while working at an archaeological site in the central part of Thailand. The dropping was smooth, gray, cylindrical and curved slightly to one side – a simple object, but a potential “treasure trove,” according to a statement.What Did the Coprolite Contain?Later ...read more

After a retired speech-language pathologist had a stroke, he struggled to articulate his thoughts, even though he knew what he wanted to say. His wife didn't understand the source of his difficulties until a clinician showed her a video that explained what her husband wished he could tell her: His stroke caused apraxia.Apraxia is a term used to describe a list of neurological disorders that impact speech, movement or gestures. Clinicians have observed apraxia for centuries, but they still don ...read more

Half a billion years ago, in the earliest days of animal life, there were few undersea predators. A strange shrimp-like creature that grew up to 6 feet in length and wielded twin claws served as top predator. Meanwhile, small chaetognath worms snapped at prey with a mouth that bristled with spines.But these sparse ranks have just gotten a little less sparse.A new fossil discovery has confirmed that a much more familiar predator, a type of jellyfish, also stalked the oceans more than 500 million ...read more