Life as a scribe in Ancient Egypt took its toll on the body. Researchers examining the bones of these ancient writers found them riddled with arthritis and other work-related wear and tear, offering fascinating insights into their lives. They detailed their findings in a study published in the journal Scientific Reports.Researchers from the Czech Republic studied the remains of 69 individuals who were buried in the Abusir necropolis in Egypt over 4000 years ago, between 2700 and 2180 B.C.E. Th ...read more
Billions of birds are flying south for the annual fall migration, including 4.7 billion leaving the U.S. alone, bound for Mexico, Central and South America. Sadly, over the past 50 years, North American bird populations dropped by nearly 3 billion, due to habitat loss, climate change, and massive development along their flight paths. An estimated one billion deaths per year are due to building collisions, with light pollution being an amplifying factor.We (scientists, conservationists, media and ...read more
The blue whale is renowned as the Earth’s largest animal, taking that title today by quite some distance. That holds true even stretching back through time as these enormous marine mammals are even bigger than some of the largest of the dinosaurs.How Big Is a Blue Whale?(Credit: Ajit S N/Shutterstock)The largest blue whale ever found stretched 33 meters (108 feet) and was caught by whalers in the early 1900s. Usually, however, they can range between 24 and 30 meters (78-98 feet) in length, dep ...read more
Bite force is the amount of pressure and force in an animal’s bite. It’s measured in psi (pounds per square inch). But no matter the unit of measurement when these mega-predators chomp down, you’d better hope you’re not on the receiving end of it. Just to give you some perspective, the bite force of a measly human is just 162 psi. Here are some animals with the strongest bite force. 1. Nile Crocodiles — 5000 PSI(Credit: KateShots/Shutterstock) Nile crocodiles are the second largest ...read more
After delivering a guest lecture on sticklebacks, an unfamiliar fish caught Stanford University researcher David Kingsley’s eye. When he walked past an aquarium at the Woods Hole Marine Biology Laboratory, a strange aquatic creature stopped him in his tracks.“I did this huge double take because I looked in this one tank, and there was one of the weirdest fish I've ever seen,” says Kingsley. “It had the body of a fish, the wings of a bird, and it was walking along the bottom of the tank o ...read more
Author Vishay SinghPosted on Categories Discover Magazine