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Categories: Ecology: Extinction, Space: Cosmology

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While testing how well commercial bumblebees pollinate early spring crops, researchers made a surprising discovery: dead wild bumblebee queens in the hives, an average of 10 per nest box.

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Thanks to the James Webb Space Telescope's first images of galaxy clusters, researchers have, for the very first time, been able to examine very compact structures of star clusters inside galaxies, so-called clumps.

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Roughly 500 million light-years away, near the constellation Delphinus, two galaxies are colliding. Known as merging galaxy IIZw096, the luminous phenomenon is obscured by cosmic dust, but researchers first identified a bright, energetic source of light 12 years ago. Now, with a more advanced telescope, the team has pinpointed the precise location of what they have dubbed the 'engine' of the merging galaxy.

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Researchers discovered a new species of frog in Africa that has an unusual trait: it's completely silent. The Ukaguru spiny-throated reed frog does not croak, sing or ribbit. Found in Tanzania's Ukaguru Mountains for which it is named, Hyperolius ukaguruensis is among the few frogs around the world that do not vocalize to other frogs.

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Biologists explored how symbiotic relationships between species evolve to become specific or general, cooperative or antagonistic.

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Insects play crucial roles in almost every ecosystem -- they pollinate more than 80% of plants and are a major source of food for thousands of vertebrate species -- but insect populations are collapsing around the globe, and they continue to be overlooked by conservation efforts. Protected areas can safeguard threatened species but only if these threatened species actually live within the areas we protect. A new study found that 76% of insect species are not adequately covered by protected areas.

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Astronomers using data from the SMARTS 1.5-meter Telescope at the Cerro Tololo Inter-American Observatory (CTIO), have made the first confirmed detection of a star system that will one day form a kilonova -- the ultra-powerful, gold-producing explosion created by merging neutron stars. These systems are so phenomenally rare that only about 10 such systems are thought to exist in the entire Milky Way.

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What happened shortly after the universe was born in the Big Bang and began to expand? Bubbles occurred and a previously unknown phase transition happened, according to particle physicists.

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As deserts expanded their range over the past 5-7 million years, many plants invaded the new biome and rapidly diversified, producing amazing adaptations to drought and heat. Can plants continue to adapt to increasing aridity caused by climate change? A new study that addressed the origins of desert adaptation concluded that one group of desert plants, rock daisies, came preadapted to aridity, likely helping them survive desert conditions. Not all plants may be so lucky.

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A group of scientists have released one of the most precise measurements ever made of how matter is distributed across the universe today.

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A new study has uncovered a new thalattosuchian -- an ancient 'sister' of modern-day crocodiles' ancestors.

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New research provides rare evidence that natural hybridization can reduce the risk of extinction of species threatened by climate change. Researchers have identified genes that enable Rainbowfish to adapt to climate variations across the Australia using environmental models to work out how much evolution will likely be required for populations to keep pace with future climate change.

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A new study has for the first time predicted which invasive species could pose a future threat to the UK's ecologically unique Overseas Territories.

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The most sensitive telescope now searching for radio signals from cosmic dawn, an era around 200 million years after the Big Bang when stars ignited, has doubled its sensitivity, a new paper reports. While not yet detecting this radiation -- the redshifted 21-centimeter line -- they have put new limits on the elemental composition of galaxies during the Epoch of Reionization. Early galaxies seem to be low in metals, fitting the most popular theory of cosmic evolution.

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Rapid economic growth has pushed rare species of big carnivores to the brink of extinction, but ecologists have suggested our appetite to once again live alongside big cats is increasing.

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Federal environmental laws are failing to mitigate against Australia's extinction crisis, according to new research.

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Researchers report that elephants play a key role in creating forests which store more atmospheric carbon and maintaining the biodiversity of forests in Africa. If the already critically endangered elephants become extinct, rainforest of central and west Africa, the second largest rainforest on earth, would lose between six and nine percent of their ability to capture atmospheric carbon, amplifying planetary warming.

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Astronomers used observations from the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) to achieve the darkest ever view of a dense interstellar cloud. These observations have revealed the composition of a virtual treasure chest of ices from the early universe, providing new insights into the chemical processes of one of the coldest, darkest places in the universe as well as the origins of the molecules that make up planetary atmospheres.

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Protected natural areas of the UK are struggling to halt declines in insects and spiders that have occurred over the past 30 years, according to a new study.

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Intact forests are important climate regulators and harbors of biodiversity, but they are rapidly disappearing. Agriculture is commonly considered to be the major culprit behind forest loss, but the authors of a new article show that agriculture isn't solely to blame. For forest loss associated with the 2014 world economy, over 60% was related to final consumption of non-agricultural products, such as minerals, metals and wood-related goods, and the authors argue that we must consider international trade markets when designing conservation strategies.