The last week of spring has been cooler than average, with lots of rain. It's shrub pruning time as many plants have finished flowering. For Rachelle and I summer is socializing time, our calendar is full of visits here and there. We will be seeing folks we haven't socialized with for years, we look forward greatly for this.
stinging nettle, good for our herbal medicine, not so good for bare hands, lol
sedum covers the old front paved sidewalk
I should check to see if these guys are edible, there seems to be quite a few around this stump up to a meter plus away.
around a cut down silver maple
viburnum one of several types in the yard
mock orange opened up this week
mock orange.
Russian sage (blue)
Potentilla
Salvia perennial, Victoria blue
blooms all summer, stays the same size, dry soil, perfect for this location.
old front walk
the rain this week has this last blooming peony now lying down.
Wow the light in this cloud was strong, the pic doesn't do it justice.
Mosses are famous for surviving conditions that would kill most plants, but new research suggests they may not be doing it alone.
Credit: Shutterstock
A surprising discovery inside desert mosses could reshape scientists’ understanding of plant evolution.
In some of the driest places on Earth, the ground itself can be alive. What looks like a thin, dark crust on desert soil may actually be a miniature ecosystem, packed with mosses, fungi, bacteria, algae, and tiny animals. These biological soil crusts help hold fragile landscapes together, trapping dust, storing nutrients, and protecting the ground from erosion.
Mosses are among the toughest members of these communities. They can dry out until they appear nearly dead, then revive after a brief rain. Some species survive on bare rock, endure intense heat, and tolerate long stretches without water. Their durability has even led scientists to explore whether mosses could someday help support life in extreme environments beyond Earth.
Now, researchers at UC Riverside say desert mosses may have another survival tool: fungi living inside their tissues. The evidence, published in New Phytologist, points to a relationship that has not previously been documented in mosses.
If confirmed, the finding could reshape a basic assumption about moss biology. It may also offer a new window into one of the biggest turning points in Earth’s history, when plants first began spreading across land roughly 470 million years ago.
Moss collected at the Anza-Borrego Research Station. Tiny features help researchers identify the species.
Credit: Kian Kelly/UCR
Why Mosses Were Thought To Be Different
Most land plants do not face the world alone. More than 85% form relationships with fungi that help them obtain nutrients from soil. In return, the fungi receive sugars that plants make through photosynthesis.
One of the most important groups in these partnerships is arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi, or AMF. These fungi are found with about three-quarters of plant species and are known for forming tiny branching structures inside plant roots, where nutrients can be exchanged.
Mosses have long been treated as an exception. Unlike flowering plants, trees, and many crops, mosses lack true roots. For decades, scientists generally believed that all 10,000 known moss species lived without this kind of fungal partnership.
“That’s been the model,” said Jason Stajich, a UCR professor of microbiology and plant pathology and co-author of the study. Mosses, he explained, simply didn’t need fungi.
Searching the Desert for Clues
To examine that assumption, UCR doctoral researcher Kian Kelly collected mosses from the Mojave and Sonoran deserts, where daytime temperatures can rise above 100 degrees Fahrenheit (38 degrees Celsius). These deserts are harsh field sites, but they are also ideal places to study survival strategies because water is scarce, heat is intense, and life is under constant pressure.
Kelly focused on mosses growing in biological soil crusts. These crusts are sometimes described as the living skin of deserts because they help stabilize loose soil and support dryland ecosystems. They are also extremely fragile. A single footprint, tire track, or other disturbance can damage them for decades.
Photos show moss’s ability to spring back to life with exposure to moisture. Same species on both sides.
Credit: Kian Kelly/UCR
“Sometimes I couldn’t find the same species of moss,” Kelly explained, describing long searches in extreme heat to collect comparable moss species from both desert and less arid environments.
The researchers wanted to know whether mosses from different climates contained different fungal communities. That question matters because drylands are expanding in many parts of the world. If certain fungi help mosses tolerate hot, dry conditions, they could influence how desert ecosystems respond to climate change.
Fungal DNA Reveals a Surprise
In the lab, the team ground up moss samples and searched for fungal DNA. The results showed that fungi were present inside the mosses.
The most unexpected finding was the presence of mycorrhizal fungi, which are known to depend on plant partners. These fungi were not simply the same organisms found in the nearby soil. The fungal communities inside desert mosses also differed from those in mosses collected from less severe environments.
“We suspect that certain fungi are more helpful for surviving hotter, drier climates,” Kelly said.
That pattern made contamination less likely. If the fungi had merely come from dirt stuck to the mosses, the researchers would have expected the DNA inside the plants to look more like the DNA in surrounding soil. Instead, the results suggested a more selective relationship.
Microscopy Strengthens the Case
DNA alone cannot prove that fungi are actively living within plant tissues. To look for physical evidence, Kelly stained moss tissue with a blue dye that binds to fungi, then examined the samples under a microscope.
Inside moss cells, he saw branching fungal structures.
“As soon as I saw that, I knew we had something really interesting,” Kelly said.
The structures resembled arbuscules, the tree-like formations that mycorrhizal fungi typically build inside plant roots. But mosses do not have true roots, and these structures appeared in leaves instead.
For that reason, the researchers call them “arbuscule-like.” The structures look similar to known nutrient exchange sites in other plants, but scientists still need to show whether mosses and fungi are actually trading resources. Until that happens, the relationship cannot be formally described as a true symbiosis.
A Possible Link to the First Land Plants
The discovery could have implications far beyond desert ecology. Mosses belong to an ancient lineage of plants and are close relatives of some of the earliest plants that lived on land.
When plants first moved out of water, they faced major challenges. They needed ways to obtain nutrients, avoid drying out, and survive without the support of an aquatic environment. Fungal partners may have helped early plants overcome some of those barriers. Evidence of plant and fungal associations appears deep in the fossil record, and many scientists consider these partnerships central to the greening of Earth’s continents.
If mosses can host mycorrhizal fungi in a way that scientists previously missed, it could change how researchers think about the early evolution of plant-fungal relationships.
Why It Matters for Desert Recovery
The findings may also point toward new restoration strategies for damaged drylands. Biological soil crusts are increasingly threatened by warming temperatures, drought, grazing, off-road vehicles, and foot traffic. Because these communities grow slowly, recovery can take years or even decades.
For now, the study does not prove that fungi are helping mosses survive. It does, however, reveal a hidden association that scientists did not expect to find.
“The desert,” Kelly said, “is full of things people overlook. Sometimes, the biggest surprises are the ones growing quietly beneath our feet.”
The brain doesn’t simply watch other people. It appears to translate what we see into touch-like experiences using a network of hidden body maps in the visual cortex. That process may help explain empathy and why another person’s pain can feel surprisingly real.
Credit: Shutterstock
Scientists discovered that the visual brain may secretly “feel” what it sees, turning sight into physical experience and helping make empathy possible.
Working with researchers from institutions around the world, Nicholas Hedger (University of Reading) and Tomas Knapen (Netherlands Institute for Neuroscience & Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam) investigated one of neuroscience’s biggest questions: how humans experience the world around them.
Their research uncovered a remarkable process in which the brain converts visual information into touch-related representations, helping create the rich, physical reality we experience every day. According to Knapen, “This aspect of human experience is a fantastic area for AI development.”
Why Seeing Someone Get Hurt Makes You Flinch
Imagine preparing dinner with a friend when they accidentally cut themselves. Almost instantly, you may grimace, wince, or even jerk your own hand away.
Those reactions happen because the brain’s touch-processing region, known as the somatosensory cortex, becomes active even though nothing physically happened to you.
But how can simply watching another person trigger the brain’s sense of touch?
To investigate, researchers from the UK, USA, and VU, NIN (KNAW) in Amsterdam turned to an unexpected source of data: Hollywood movies.
Somatosensory cortex activity in the human brain.
Credit: Netherlands Institute for Neuroscience
Using Hollywood Films to Study Human Experience
Tomas Knapen (last author) and Nicholas Hedger (first author) examined a dataset collected from volunteers who watched clips from movies such as The Social Network and Inception while undergoing brain scans.
Their goal was to identify the neural systems that transform visual information into meaningful experiences, allowing people to do more than simply see the world around them.
Hidden Body Maps in the Visual Brain
When neuroscientists refer to “maps” in the brain, they are describing organized patterns that represent information about the body and environment.
One well-known example is found in the somatosensory cortex, where different areas correspond to different body parts. One end of the map processes sensations from the feet, while the opposite end processes sensations from the head. These organized layouts help the brain determine where a sensation originates.
The researchers were surprised to find similar maps within the visual cortex. This suggests that the brain may organize what we see in ways that closely resemble how it processes physical touch.
“We found not one, or two, but eight remarkably similar maps in the visual cortex!” Knapen explains. “Finding so many shows how strongly the visual brain speaks the language of touch.”
These visual maps mirror the body’s arrangement within the somatosensory cortex from head to toe — suggesting that when we observe another person, the brain organizes that visual information using patterns similar to those involved in physical sensation.
Bodily maps discovered in the visual cortex.
Credit: Netherlands Institute for Neuroscience
Why the Brain Uses Multiple Body Maps
The discovery of eight separate maps raises an obvious question: Why does the brain need so many?
The researchers believe different maps serve different functions. Some appear to specialize in identifying body parts, while others focus more on where those body parts are located in space.
“I think that there are many more purposes, but we just haven’t been able to test them yet,” Knapen adds.
These maps may help people extract different types of information depending on what matters most in a given moment.
“Say you stand up and grab a cup of coffee. If I’m interested in what you’re doing, I will probably focus on your hand grabbing the cup. Now imagine that I’m more interested in your emotional state. In that case, I might focus more on your overall posture or your facial expressions. Every time you look at a person, there are many different bodily translations that need to be conducted visually. We think that these maps are a fundamental ingredient in that exact process.”
Although maintaining several overlapping maps might seem inefficient, Knapen argues that it actually makes the brain more flexible.
“This allows the brain to have many types of information in a single space, and make a translation in any way that is relevant in that moment,” he explains.
Implications for Autism Research and Neurotechnology
The findings open the door to a wide range of future studies.
Because these body maps appear to be involved in emotional processing, they could provide new insights into social psychology and eventually contribute to clinical applications.
“People with autism can struggle with this sort of processing. Having this information could help us better identify effective treatments,” Knapen explains.
The research could also have implications for brain-computer interfaces and other forms of neurotechnology.
“Training sets for brain implants often start off with instructions like ‘try to think of a movement’. If these bodily processes can be activated in much broader ways, then there might be much broader possibilities to train and develop those brain-computer interfaces.”
What This Discovery Could Mean for AI
Knapen believes the work may also help guide future advances in artificial intelligence.
“Our bodies are deeply intertwined with our experiences and understanding of the world. Current AI primarily relies on text and video, lacking this bodily dimension. This aspect of human experience is a fantastic area for AI development. Our work shows the potential for very large, precision brain imaging datasets to fuel this development: a beautiful synergy between neuroscience and AI.”
For Knapen, however, the biggest takeaway is not technological.
“I just want to understand the depths of the human experience, and it really feels like we just found this central ingredient for it.”
Genetic information in the DNA and modifications, such as DNA methylation, define the epigenetic landscape and phenotype and show both Mendelian and non-Mendelian heredity.
Credit: Art design by Michael Koldobskiy and Andrew Feinberg, illustration by Kate Zvorykina
Scientists found that some inherited traits can bypass the traditional rules of genetics, revealing a surprising new layer of inheritance beyond DNA.
For more than a century, Gregor Mendel’s laws of inheritance have served as the foundation of genetics. But new research suggests that inheritance can be more complicated than the DNA sequences passed from parents to their children.
In a federally funded study involving mice, scientists found that certain inherited epigenetic marks, which are chemical modifications that influence gene activity without altering the underlying DNA code, can be transmitted across generations in ways that do not follow Mendel’s classic rules. The researchers estimate that about 7% of the epigenetic inheritance patterns they examined fell outside traditional Mendelian expectations.
The findings also revealed rare forms of inheritance that had not previously been documented in mammals, including a naturally occurring example of paramutation, a phenomenon previously observed in plants and fruit flies.
“Non-Mendelian patterns of inheriting epigenetics could be a faster way to acquire diverse or new traits than alterations in the genomic sequence itself, especially in response to environmental pressures,” says Andrew Feinberg, M.D., Bloomberg Distinguished Professor in the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Whiting School of Engineering and Bloomberg School of Public Health, and co-leader of the research with colleagues at Texas A&M University.
The study was published in Nature Genetics and was supported by the National Institutes of Health and the National Science Foundation.
Looking Beyond Mendel’s Laws
Mendel’s laws describe how different versions of genes, known as alleles, are inherited. These principles explain how dominant and recessive traits are passed from one generation to the next. In mammals, offspring inherit one allele from each parent, and dominant alleles generally determine which traits are expressed.
Scientists have long known that some inherited effects fall outside those rules. One example is genomic imprinting, in which chemical tags can silence a gene depending on whether it came from the mother or father. In these cases, gene activity is controlled by the parent of origin rather than by whether the allele is dominant or recessive.
The new study identified imprinting in five additional genes. More importantly, it suggested that non-Mendelian epigenetic inheritance may occur more often than previously recognized.
Researchers also observed inherited epigenetic patterns in offspring that were not detected in either parent, an unexpected result that challenges conventional assumptions about inheritance.
Tracking Epigenetic Changes Across Generations
The team focused on DNA methylation, a common epigenetic modification in which chemical groups containing carbon and hydrogen atoms attach to promoter regions of genes. These promoter regions help control whether a gene is switched on or off.
To investigate how methylation is inherited, scientists analyzed tissue samples from three generations of mice between 4 and 6 months of age. The study included 26 mice in the first generation, 34 offspring in the second generation, and 19 mice in the third generation.
Researchers examined large portions of the mouse genome and tracked both genetic variation and 12 known inheritance patterns involving DNA methylation.
Feinberg collaborated with co-corresponding authors David Threadgill, Ph.D., Regents professor at Texas A&M University, and Kasper Hansen, Ph.D., professor of biostatistics at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. Together with Johns Hopkins graduate student Adam Davidovich, the team developed new laboratory and computational methods that allowed them to analyze genomic and methylation data simultaneously. Surprising Cases of Inheritance
Across the study, the researchers identified 522 cases, representing approximately 7% of epigenetic inheritance patterns, in which methylation on non-sex chromosomes was inherited in ways that did not conform to Mendel’s laws.
Among those were 54 rare or “emergent” inheritance events that appeared in offspring even though neither parent showed the same methylation pattern.
For example, when two mice lacking methylation on a specific allele were bred, researchers sometimes observed offspring with methylation on both copies of that allele.
“The methylation seemingly appeared out of nowhere,” says Feinberg.
The team also identified a naturally occurring example of paramutation in a mammalian gene called Capn11, which plays a role in normal sperm development through calcium-dependent regulation. Mutations affecting the human version of the gene are linked to infertility and sperm abnormalities.
Paramutation occurs when methylation associated with one allele triggers methylation in another allele. The researchers found this effect in a region containing a repetitive genetic element known to be sensitive to environmental influences.
“It’s almost like the methylation is transferred to another allele,” says Feinberg.
Previous studies have linked epigenetic changes to environmental factors including stress, trauma, and diet.
Implications for Human Health and Disease
The findings suggest that scientists may need to consider both genetic and epigenetic information to fully understand how traits, diseases, and health outcomes are inherited.
“This work may convince scientists to integrate both genomics and epigenomics more often for a complete understanding of how traits that produce disease and healthy states are inherited,” says Hansen.
To carry out the study, researchers relied on long-read DNA sequencing technology, which can analyze DNA fragments ranging from about 10,000 base pairs to more than one million base pairs in length. Although more labor-intensive than short-read sequencing, the technique is better suited for identifying differences between alleles and detecting methylation sites located far from the main body of a gene.
The researchers plan to extend their work to human genomic data. Future studies could help scientists better understand unusual inheritance patterns in families affected by disease and provide new insight into how environmental factors such as diet may influence inheritance across generations.
(UnexpectedDinoLesson/Wikimedia Commons/CC BY 4.0)
More than 100 million years ago, a flying reptile called a pterosaur flew over the oceans hunting squid and fish.
Much more recently, one of its wing bones was discovered in Brazil, transformed over the aeons into a fossil made of a complex assemblage of different chemicals and minerals.
And in new research published in iScience, my colleagues and I found that the fossil bone still holds secrets of the creature's life, including microscopic inner structures of its bones and molecular traces of its biology and diet.
A fossil treasure from Brazil
The fossil comes from the Romualdo Formation in the Araripe Basin of northeastern Brazil, one of the world's most spectacular fossil deposits. The site has yielded exquisitely preserved fish, turtles, crocodile relatives, and pterosaurs.
Many fossils from the Romualdo Formation are preserved inside rounded rock nodules known as carbonate concretions. These mineral structures form shortly after burial, effectively sealing the remains from the environment.
Think of them as natural time capsules.
A microscope view of a section of the pterosaur fossil shows its dark carbon coating and mineral layers.
(Grice et al.)
Our fossil is a hollow wing bone, or phalanx. Pterosaur bones were thin and lightweight to aid flight, so they are rarely preserved in such detail.
Using high-resolution CT scanning, we examined the bone's interior without breaking it open. The scans revealed layers of minerals with different densities filling the cavity – evidence of a complex sequence of chemical events that preserved the bone. We used several other methods to identify the minerals.
Microbes helped decay – and preservation
The fossil's exceptional preservation may have begun with decay. As the pterosaur's body decomposed on the ancient seafloor, microbes broke down tissues and altered sediment chemistry. These changes triggered the rapid formation of phosphate minerals.
One mineral in particular, called fluorapatite, formed within and around the bone, stabilising delicate features before they could be lost. Under the microscope, we could still see microscopic canals that once carried nutrients through living tissue.
Mineral analysis revealed evidence of microbial activity. We detected barite and celestite, minerals associated with sulphur-using bacteria. These microbes drove chemical reactions that helped create the conditions necessary for preservation.
In other words, ancient microbes didn't just decay the body, they also helped preserve it for science.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4ySNUz8TRww
A mineral vault for ancient molecules
After early phosphate minerals stabilised the bone, a sequence of calcite layers gradually formed inside and around it. These derived largely from carbon released during the decay of fatty tissue.
First, a thin layer of fine-grained calcite formed along the bone surface, followed by a second, slightly coarser-grained one. Over a longer period of time, larger calcite crystals formed, ultimately filling the bone cavity.
Analysis showed this calcite was low in an isotope called carbon-13, which indicates it partly came from organic carbon sources, such as fatty lipids and residual bone material. In contrast, any remaining organic matter in the bone appears to have relatively high levels of carbon-13.
The multi-layered mineral barrier acted like a geological vault, protecting delicate structures and organic compounds trapped in the bone from chemical degradation for millions of years.
This protection allowed molecular traces such as steroid biomarkers and collagen fibre patterns to survive, giving us a rare window into the biology and diet of this ancient flying reptile.
Molecular traces of ancient life
Within this mineralised structure, we detected molecular traces of life called steranes, which are derived from steroidal lipids once present in living cells. To our knowledge, this is the first time steroid biomarkers have been reported from a pterosaur fossil.
Even more exciting, these molecules carry dietary clues. Carbon isotope analysis of cholesterol-derived compounds suggests this pterosaur likely fed on fish or squid-like marine animals, which is what we would expect from the shape of its teeth and skull.
The fossil also preserves microscopic structures resembling collagen fibres, the protein framework that strengthens bone. Although chemically altered over millions of years, the fibre patterns remain visible and resemble those seen in modern birds, which are distant relatives of pterosaurs.
Reading fossils in new ways
Discoveries like this one are transforming how we study fossils. Instead of examining only bone shapes, we can now recover chemical and molecular fingerprints as well.
Understanding how these exceptional fossils form may help identify other specimens capable of preserving ancient biomolecules. More broadly, our findings show that under the right conditions, molecular traces of life can survive for more than 100 million years.
Even after millions upon millions of years, ancient life can still leave behind chemical clues waiting to be discovered.
As analytical techniques continue to advance and unusual modes of preservation become better understood, there is increasing potential to recover previously inaccessible information.
In the future, we may even be able to detect ancient DNA fragments or other molecular remnants in exceptionally preserved fossils, including those of dinosaurs and pterosaurs.
Kliti Grice, John Curtin Distinguished Professor of Organic and Isotope Geochemistry, Curtin University
Here's a question that sounds like science fiction but is being asked in deadly earnest by serious philosophers.
Does consciousness require flesh and blood?
It's a question I wrestled with myself when I wrote a novel that addresses the very nature of consciousness in the Universe, so a new paper – claiming the answer is almost certainly no – caught my eye at once.
That's the conclusion of Eric Schwitzgebel, a distinguished professor of philosophy at the University of California, Riverside.
In the new working paper written with former UCR graduate student Jeremy Pober, now at the University of Lisbon, the pair argue that consciousness could arise in life forms built from radically different stuff than us.
Picture the rock-skinned, crystal-brained alien from the recent film Project Hail Mary, and you are somewhere close to what they have in mind.
The two philosophers are careful not to overreach, since they don't try to define consciousness, and they don't claim exotic alien minds definitely exist.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qj_AbV1Ph90
Instead, they start from a simpler premise, that consciousness is real and recognizable, and ask a narrower question.
Must it be tied to the particular biology that happens to have evolved on Earth?
Their argument rests on an idea called substrate flexibility.
A property is substrate-flexible if you can achieve it with different materials. A cup holds water whether it's glass or plastic. Music plays whether it's pressed into vinyl or burned onto a disc.
Consciousness, they suggest, is the same.
It is a phenomenon that could be realized in more than one kind of physical machinery.
An octopus: an alien-seeming intelligence that evolved on Earth. Even here, nature builds minds to more than one plan.
(NOAA Ocean Exploration/2021 ROV Shakedown)
It's interesting to then apply this to the size of the observable Universe, which holds something like a trillion galaxies, and planets are believed to be everywhere.
The authors conservatively estimate that at least a thousand behaviourally sophisticated civilizations have existed somewhere in the history of the cosmos.
If life can take hold under wildly different chemical conditions, across that many opportunities, it would be very odd if every successful lineage settled on exactly the same biochemical recipe.
This is where Copernicus comes in. Each great astronomical discovery has shoved humanity a little further from the center of things.
Schwitzgebel and Pober extend that humbling lesson to the mind itself, coining the phrase "the Copernican principle of consciousness."
To assume awareness belongs only to creatures like us, they argue, is a kind of terrocentrism, an unjustified conceit that Earthly life is uniquely special.
Voyager 1's iconic photograph of Earth, a pale blue speck in a sunbeam, snapped at a distance of 3.7 billion miles (6 billion kilometers) from the Sun. If we're not central to the Universe, the philosophers ask, why assume consciousness is ours alone? (NASA/JPL Caltech)
And inevitably, the argument circles back to artificial intelligence. The two don't agree here.
Pober warns that flexibility across some substrates doesn't mean every substrate qualifies, so today's silicon may not make the cut.
Schwitzgebel is more open, noting that once you drop the demand for human biology, excluding silicon purely for being silicon gets harder to defend.
On one point they agree.
The real question isn't whether a machine can copy a human brain, but what kinds of systems can wake up at all.
Remote Scottish islands turned tiny wrens into giant birds that may be evolving into new species.
Tiny wrens living on remote Scottish islands are providing scientists with a rare look at how evolution can reshape animals in isolated environments. A new study led by researchers at the University of Birmingham found that several island populations of wrens have followed their own evolutionary paths, with some growing dramatically larger than their mainland relatives.
The findings, published in the Evolutionary Journal of the Linnean Society, offer fresh insight into the biological phenomenon known as “island syndromes.” These are recurring evolutionary patterns seen in species that become isolated on islands.
Researchers focused on four subspecies of wrens found only on Scottish islands and archipelagos: Shetland, Fair Isle, the Outer Hebrides, and St Kilda. Although these birds live in broadly similar island environments, each population has remained geographically separated and differs noticeably from wrens found across mainland Great Britain and continental Europe. Giant Wrens on Remote Scottish Islands
One of the most striking discoveries involved a phenomenon known as island gigantism, in which animals evolve larger body sizes after becoming isolated on islands.
Famous examples include the giant tortoises of the Galรกpagos Islands and the extinct dodo of Mauritius, both of which became much larger than their mainland ancestors. The new study shows that Scottish wrens may represent an unusually extreme bird example of the same process.
Scientists found that wren populations on Shetland and St Kilda show very little evidence of interbreeding with mainland birds. These isolated populations have also grown significantly larger over time.
A Shetland Wren in hand in Kergord, Mainland, Shetland.
Credit: Michaล T. Jezierski, University of Birmingham
A typical wren from England weighs between 7 and 10 grams. By comparison, wrens living on St Kilda weigh between 13 and 16 grams. The largest St Kilda birds are more than twice the size of the smallest wrens found on mainland Great Britain. According to the researchers, this places them among the top 25% of known cases of island gigantism in birds worldwide.
Dr. Michaล Jezierski, from the School of Geography, Earth and Environmental Sciences and lead author of the study, said: “We found that all four Scottish Wren subspecies are genetically distinct from the Wrens of mainland Britain; with the Wrens of Shetland and St Kilda being especially distinct in both appearance and song. Their genetic distinctiveness is so high, that it is likely they are on their way to becoming new species.”
Signs of New Species Emerging
To investigate these populations, researchers combined body measurements, song recordings, and whole genome sequencing. This approach allowed them to compare island and mainland wrens in unprecedented detail and better understand how island syndromes develop.
The results showed that each island population has become genetically distinct and remains largely isolated from the others.
The wrens of Shetland and St Kilda are particularly interesting because they appear very similar physically, yet the genetic changes that separate them from mainland wrens are largely different. In other words, the two groups arrived at similar outcomes through different genetic routes.
By contrast, wrens living on Fair Isle and in the Outer Hebrides remain more similar to mainland populations. This suggests that even neighboring island groups do not necessarily evolve in the same way.
Parallel Evolution in Action
According to the researchers, the similarities between the Shetland and St Kilda wrens are an example of parallel evolution.
Dr. Jezierski explained: “Our genomic data indicates that Shetland and St Kilda Wrens are genetically distinct from each other, despite their similarities in physical appearance. This means that their island gigantism is a case of ‘parallel evolution’, where a similar original population (probably colonists from the British mainland) made it to each island archipelago, and then independently evolved to become island giants. In the process, their songs also became very different from those of ‘mainland’ British birds.”
The findings suggest that similar island environments can push populations toward comparable traits, even when the underlying genetic changes differ.
Will Smith, from the University of Nottingham and a co-author of the study, said: “Our research suggests that islands with similar environments can produce similar evolutionary outcomes using different genetic pathways. The Wrens of Scotland provide us with a powerful case study to understand the mechanisms by which island biodiversity is generated worldwide.”
Unlocking the Mystery of Island Evolution
Islands are home to an estimated 20% to 30% of the world’s species and are known for producing unusual forms of wildlife, from Madagascar’s lemurs to Indonesia’s Komodo dragons. Because islands are naturally isolated and often have fewer predators and competitors than nearby mainland regions, they create unique evolutionary conditions.
Scientists have observed island syndromes in a wide range of plants and animals around the world. Common traits include larger body size, longer lifespans, slower reproduction, and in birds, reduced flight ability. Despite how widespread these patterns are, researchers still do not fully understand the biological mechanisms that drive them.
The Scottish wrens also show other traits commonly linked to island evolution. Along with their larger size, they have developed distinctive songs as well as subtle differences in plumage and body shape.
Although the reasons behind island gigantism and other island syndromes remain uncertain, the researchers say these wren populations provide an exceptional opportunity to explore how evolution works in isolated environments. By studying these birds, scientists hope to better understand the small-scale evolutionary processes that eventually produce the remarkable biodiversity seen on islands around the world.
An artist’s reconstruction of a Neanderthal, displayed in the exhibition ‘Britain: One Million Years of the Human Story’.
Source: The Trustees of the Natural History Museum, London
Neanderthals are generally classified by palaeontologists as the species Homo neanderthalensis, but some consider them to be a subspecies of Homo sapiens (Homo sapiens neanderthalensis). The first humans with proto-Neanderthal traits are believed to have existed in Europe as early as 600,000–350,000 years ago, and they died out around 30,000 years ago.
When it comes to behaviors, Neanderthals tend to get a pretty bad rap. However, a plethora of research over the last several years has been breaking down many of the myths associated with this ancient species.
Once depicted as barbaric, grunting, sub-humans, Neanderthals are now known to have had the same or similar levels of intelligence as modern humans. They also had their own distinct culture. Here we examine 10 myths about Neanderthals which have now been proven false.
The belief in the barbaric, grunting, primitive Neanderthal is changing. (anibal /Adobe Stock)
Myth 1: Neanderthal Tools were not as Good as Tools Made by Modern Humans
The predominant belief in mainstream archaeology over a decade ago was that Neanderthals only utilized very simplistic tools, like sharpened stones. However, research conducted over the last 10 years has revised this perspective based on new archaeological evidence.
An investigation conducted in France , for example, analyzed artifacts unearthed from an archaeological site known as Abri du Maras, in the Middle Rhรดne Valley. The researchers found Levalloise flakes, which are associated with Neanderthal stone tool technology, traces of twisted fiber, suggesting the manufacture of cordage or string, and six lithic points that appear to be related to complex projectile technology, a development usually only associated with early modern humans.
A second study suggested that Neanderthals even passed on some of their tool-making abilities to humans . Dutch scientists discovered 50,000-year-old tools made from deer ribs in south-west France, which are similar to bone lissoirs or smoothers, still used by leather workers today, and contain a polished tip which creates softer and more water resistant leather when scraped against a hide. The excavated tools are similar to others found at sites occupied by early modern humans around 10,000 years later.
Neanderthal may have taught Homo sapiens new tool making technologies.
(Andy Ilmberger / Adobe Stock)
Modern humans (Homo sapiens) appear to have entered Europe with only pointed bone tools but soon after their arrival they started to make lissoirs, providing the first possible evidence that Neanderthals invented the specialized bone tools and passed their know-how on to Homo sapiens.
Myth 2:Neanderthals Spoke through Grunts and Animal Sounds
It was long believed that Neanderthals lacked the necessary cognitive capacity and vocal hardware for speech and language, rendering them incapable of little more than a series of grunts. However, recent research has revealed that Neanderthals most likely had a sophisticated form of speech and language not dissimilar to Homo sapiens.
Researchers utilized the latest 3D X-ray imaging technology to examine a 60,000-year-old Neanderthal hyoid bone discovered in the Kebara Cave in Israel in 1989. The hyoid bone is situated centrally in the upper part of the neck, beneath the mandible but above the larynx and is the foundation of speech. So far, it has only been found to exist in humans and Neanderthals. The results showed that in terms of mechanical behavior, the Neanderthal hyoid was basically indistinguishable from our own, strongly suggesting that this key part of the vocal tract was used in exactly the same way.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o589CAu73UM
Myth 3: Neanderthals Did Not Bury their Dead
It was not so long ago that Neanderthals were considered to be little more than primitive cavemen, and they certainly weren’t considered cultured enough to bury their dead. But that belief has been upended by the discovery of a number of Neanderthal burials over the years. The finding of a 50,000-year-old Neanderthal skeleton in a cave in La Chappele-aux Saints, France revealed that the individual had been carefully placed in a grave and great care had been taken to protect his body from scavengers.
One of the most famous Neanderthal child burials was uncovered in 1961 at Roc de Marsal. The grave was in a remarkable state of preservation, considering its age of 70,000 years. It consisted of the body of a child, approximately three years of age, who had been deposited in a natural depression in the ground, and apparently placed into the form of an arc, lying on its stomach, with a hand to its head and legs bent at 90 degrees, then covered with soil. The idea that Neanderthals buried their dead fits with recent findings that they were capable of developing rich cultural practices.
Myth 4: Neanderthals Did Not Have Homes
There has been this idea that Neanderthals did not have an organized use of space, something that has always been attributed to humans. But archaeologists in Italy have found a collapsed rock shelter which has revealed that Neanderthals kept an organized and tidy home with separate spaces for preparing food, sleeping, making tools, and socializing.
The top level appears to have been used for butchering animals because it contained a high concentration of animal remains. The middle level contained the most traces of human occupation and seems to have been a long-term sleeping area. Artifacts were distributed to avoid clutter around the hearth at the back of the cave.
Finally, the bottom level was a place for shorter stays. Animal bones and stone tools were concentrated at the front rather than the rear of the shelter, suggesting that tool production took place there to take advantage of available sunlight.
Myth 5:Neanderthals were Carnivores who Only Ate Raw Meat
Neanderthals were once depicted as ape-like hominids tearing into the raw flesh of freshly hunted animals. However, recent research conducted by the Catalan Institute for Research and Advanced Studies in Barcelona discovered calcified plaque on Neanderthal fossil teeth found in El Sidrรณn cave in Spain, which suggested that this extinct human species cooked vegetables and consumed bitter-tasting medicinal plants such as chamomile and yarrow.
Sadly, the prejudiced view of Neanderthal inferiority still persists, as reflected in a statement countering that study by researcher Laura Buck from London’s Natural History Museum: “The mistake is to think that because you find plant fragments in teeth that they must have got there because these carnivores – in this case Neanderthals – had consumed them as part of a carefully constructed diet or were taken because it was realised that certain herbs and grasses had health-promoting properties. In fact, they may have got there purely because Neanderthals liked to eat the stomach contents of some of the animals they killed.”
According to Buck, Neanderthals simply weren’t intelligent enough to provide themselves with balanced diets or of treating themselves with health-restoring herbs. However, Buck was unable to present any evidence to support her claims and more recent research shows that Neanderthals ate meat, but obviously included plants in their diet as well.
Neanderthals hunted but also gathered their food.
(CSIC Spain)
Neanderthal Myth 6:They were Bad Parents
Until recently, the traditional view saw Neanderthal childhood as harsh, difficult, and dangerous. This perspective was based on preconceptions about Neanderthal inferiority and their inability to protect their children. However, recent research has shown this was not the case.
In a study published in 2014 , a team of archaeologists from the Centre for Human Palaeoecology and Evolutionary Origins at the University of York challenged the traditional perspective and claimed that Neanderthal children experienced strong emotional attachments with their immediate social group, Neanderthals would care for sick children for years, and children played a key role in society, particularly in symbolic expression.
The research team drew upon cultural and social evidence to explore the experience of Neanderthal children. They found, for example, that Neanderthal child burials were more elaborate than those of adults, suggesting strong emotional bonds and the important role that children played in the social group.
Myth 7:Neanderthals had no Cultural Expression
It is often cited in academic literature that cultural expression emerged in the Palaeolithic era, around 30,000 years ago, which rules out Neanderthal artisans since this was around the time they died out. However, evidence suggests that culture flourished much earlier, during the time in which Neanderthals roamed the planet.
Rock art in El Castillo cave in Spain, for example, has been dated to around 40,800 years old, which raises the possibility that some of the paintings could have been made by Neanderthals. In addition, evidence suggests that the Neanderthals also had music. The oldest musical instrument ever discovered is believed to be the Divje Babe flute, discovered in a cave in Slovenia in 1995, though this has been disputed.
Some prehistoric cave paintings could have been made by Neanderthals.
(nicolasprimola /Adobe Stock)
The item is a fragment of the femur of a cave bear which had been pierced with spaced holes and has been dated at 60,000-43,000 years old. Scientists who could not accept the possibility that Neanderthals were playing music rejected the claim and said that the perfectly spaced and neatly carved holes are the result of the bone fragment having been chewed by an animal. However, the general consensus that the Divje Babe flute is actually a musical instrument has been growing as the view of the Neanderthals from subhuman brutes to more sophisticated hominids is changing.
Myth 8:Neanderthals were Incapable of Showing Care and Empathy
Far from being self-centered individuals incapable of looking after anyone but themselves, there is actually much evidence to show that Neanderthals cared for the sick and old in their communities. The "Old Man of La Chapelle" is the name given to the remains of a Neanderthal male found buried in the limestone bedrock of a small cave near La Chapelle-aux-Saints, in France in 1908. He lived 56,000 years ago and was the first relatively complete skeleton of a Neanderthal ever found.
Scientists estimate he was relatively old by the time he died, as bone had re-grown along the gums where he had lost several teeth, perhaps decades before. He lacked so many teeth that he would have needed his food ground down before he was able to eat it. The old man's skeleton indicates that he also suffered from a number of afflictions, including arthritis, and had numerous broken bones, which would have made movement difficult without assistance. The other members of his group would have had to have taken care of him before his death.
Other Neanderthal remains have shown potentially life-threatening injuries which were completely healed, indicating that the individual who suffered the injuries was nursed back to health by another member of his group.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h777yfE39O8
Myth 9:Neanderthals and Humans Did Not Mix
It was once believed that Neanderthals died out before the emergence of Homo sapiens. However, this was revised when archaeological evidence revealed that there was a cross-over of at least several thousand years, if not longer, during which Neanderthals and modern humans walked the Earth together.
But the idea of interbreeding between the two species was still considered almost blasphemous, and it was not thought to have even been biologically possible. However, in recent years, with the development of techniques to analyze ancient DNA, a number of studies have revealed that Neanderthals and humans did interbreed and up to 20 per cent of Neanderthal DNA lives on in modern humans .
Myth 10: Neanderthals were our Direct Ancestors
There is a common misconception, often propagated by mistaken media reporting, that Neanderthals were the direct ancestors of Homo sapiens. In fact, Neanderthals and modern humans existed side by side as two separate groups.
DNA studies have found that the Neanderthals came from a distinct evolutionary line, and are therefore often referred to as the ‘distant cousins’ of humans. Nevertheless, the genetic mixing between the two species which came about as a result of interbreeding undoubtedly contributed to who we are today.
Scientists found that a significant share of the carbon oak trees absorb arrives after wood production has already ended. Where that carbon ultimately goes could reshape expectations for forests in a warming world.
Credit: Shutterstock
A new study reveals that oak trees can keep photosynthesizing for months after growth ends, challenging assumptions about how effectively forests convert absorbed carbon into long-term storage.
A tree can look busy long after it has stopped building itself. Its leaves may still be absorbing sunlight and pulling carbon dioxide from the air, but deep inside the trunk, the season’s wood production may already be over.
That surprising split is the focus of a new study of oak trees published in Science Advances. The researchers found that oaks can keep photosynthesizing late into the year even after their growth has shut down by mid-summer. The finding challenges a common assumption in climate models: that more photosynthesis usually means more tree growth.
A Carbon Sink With a Complication
Rising atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO2) has often been expected to boost plant photosynthesis, a response sometimes called the carbon fertilization effect. In theory, more CO2 could allow trees to absorb more carbon and grow larger, locking away some of that planet-warming gas in wood.
The new findings complicate that picture. The study suggests that carbon uptake and wood production can become separated, especially when environmental conditions are not favorable for growth. Some of the carbon absorbed after growth stops may go into leaves, roots, temporary starch reserves, soil compounds, or basic cellular maintenance rather than long-term wood storage.
That does not mean the carbon is wasted. Trees use carbon for many essential functions. But from a climate perspective, not all carbon use is equal. Carbon stored in leaves, sugars, or short-lived tissues can return to the atmosphere much faster than carbon stored in wood.
Why Climate Models May Need a Rethink
The results have important implications for how scientists estimate the future role of forests in the carbon cycle.
“Right now, most models assume that if you have photosynthesis, you have growth. We find that’s not the case,” says lead author Mukund Palat Rao, an ecoclimatologist at Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory, which is part of the Columbia Climate School. “Just because there is more photosynthesis might not necessarily mean more tree growth in the future.”
During photosynthesis, plants use sunlight to convert CO2 and water into sugars, releasing oxygen as a byproduct. In trees, some of that carbon becomes wood in trunks, branches, and roots. Some is used to grow leaves and fruits. Some is stored temporarily as starch. Some is sent belowground in compounds that feed microbes, help trees access nutrients, or defend against pathogens.
Only a portion of that carbon ends up in woody biomass, which is the part most important for long-lasting carbon storage. That makes it essential to understand when photosynthesis actually leads to growth, and when it does not.
“Understanding how photosynthesis and growth are linked is very important from the perspective of understanding how forests will store carbon over long time scales,” says Rao.
Measuring Trees Day by Day
Scientists have suspected for years that carbon uptake and tree growth do not always move in step, but the relationship has been difficult to measure clearly. Tree growth is not a smooth, constant process. A trunk can swell overnight as roots take up water, then shrink during the day as leaves lose water through transpiration. Actual growth emerges from those tiny daily changes over time.
To capture that process, Rao and his colleagues combined several kinds of observations. They used satellite data sensitive to photosynthetic activity at 137 sites across the eastern United States and California. They also analyzed instruments that measured CO2 exchange near treetops hour by hour, along with trunk-mounted sensors that tracked minute changes in tree size in real time. (Trees tend to expand at night as roots take up water, then shrink slightly in daytime as they transpire water, with the long-term trajectory adding up to growth.) The team also used tree ring records and temperature data from 1950 to the present.
Photosynthesis Continued After Growth Ended
At the eastern U.S. sites, oak trees generally added new growth from May through July. Yet their photosynthetic activity continued well into October. About 36% of their annual carbon assimilation through photosynthesis occurred after late-summer growth had already stopped.
The same general pattern appeared in California, although the seasonal timing was different. There, oak trees grew mainly from December through April. Growth slowed in mid-summer and had stopped by August, but photosynthesis continued. About 26% of annual carbon uptake at those sites occurred after growth had ceased.
The result shows that a tree’s leaves can remain active even after the tissues responsible for expanding wood have largely shut down for the year.
Water Stress May Help Explain the Split
The pattern makes biological sense. Tree growth depends on internal water pressure, which helps cells expand and allows new wood to form. When conditions become hot and dry, that pressure drops. Growth can stop quickly, even if the leaves continue photosynthesizing at a reduced rate.
“The moment you have dry and hot conditions, growth activity stops pretty instantly while photosynthesis seems to continue at a slightly decreased rate,” says Rao.
Where Does the Carbon Go?
Some of the carbon absorbed after growth stops may be stored and used to help trees restart growth the following year, according to Rao. Other portions may support new leaves and roots or be oxidized to keep cells alive through winter.
The researchers also found that the disconnect between photosynthesis and growth was strongest in years when local weather swung sharply between wet and dry extremes. Those kinds of unstable conditions are expected to become more common as the climate changes.
Rao and his colleagues are now investigating whether the same pattern appears in other tree species, ecosystems, and regions. He expects the strength of the disconnect to vary depending on forest type and climate, but the broader question remains open.
“I don’t really have answers yet,” he says. “There are many questions still left to address.”
