All placozoans are superficially identical. But comparative genomic data reveals the presence of different genera. This is the first time that a new animal genus has been defined solely by genomics.

Which group of animals evolved first? This problem has become a bone of contention among biologists. An international research team is now confident that the definitive answer is at hand: Sponges ...

Fish, flies and bears, oh my! A new research breakthrough gives genetic proof of how differences in (very different) animals develop. An international team of biologists has identified the molecular ...

Jordi Paps receives funding from the University of Essex, the Royal Society, and the Wellcome Trust. Whilst this planet has gone cycling on according to the fixed law of gravity, from so simple a ...

Nearly 30 years ago, a research vessel off the southeast coast of Australia dragged up samples of the sea floor from depths of 400m and 1000m. Hidden away within the samples were a few unexpected gems ...

An artistic reconstruction of Auroralumina attenboroughii, based on a fossil dated to the Ediacaran Period and recently discovered in the U.K.'s Charnwood Forest. ((Dunn/Kenchington, et al., Nature ...

At present there are many animal phyla that contain only a few species. The existence of these small phyla can be used to test assumptions about speciation and extinction in multicellular animals. We ...

Students set sticky traps to collect organisms, identify and classify the organisms they find, and determine when the organisms first evolved. Every school and home contains organisms. Many are too ...