Curio Cabinet / Nerdy Curio

These little critters really know how to jell. Researchers at the University of Exeter in the U.K. have found that comb jellies are capable of fusing together when injured, according to a paper published in Current Biology. Comb jellies are small (around four inches long), translucent marine invertebrates in the Ctenophora phylum. They’re truly ancient; in fact, they branched off from the single-celled common ancestor of all animals earlier than any other creatures still living today. Since they originally developed, little about them has changed, leaving them with a relatively unusual, jellyfish-like anatomy (though they’re not actually jellyfish). However, a researcher noticed a particularly strange specimen in a lab’s observation tank. Comb jellies normally have one apical organ and one lobe on their rear end that is used to eject digested food. This specimen, though, had two of each, almost as if two individual comb jellies had been stuck together. Suspecting as much, the researchers successfully replicated the fusion in other comb jellies. Apparently, when comb jellies are injured, they can combine into one to increase their chances of survival. Within hours of being grafted together, the comb jellies began acting as one, responding to muscle stimuli in sync and even digesting food through a single canal. Stranger still, although the two act as one, they maintain their own separate sets of DNA, and their morphology isn’t passed on to the next generation. Researchers believe that understanding the mechanism behind the comb jellies’ fusion could lead to advances in transplantation and regeneration. In the meantime, don’t go gluing yourself to your friends every time you scrape your knee.

[Image description: A group of comb jellies in black water.] Credit & copyright: Benoît Prieur (1975–), Wikimedia Commons. This file is made available under the Creative Commons CC0 1.0 Universal Public Domain Dedication.
 

They can leap 20 feet and they have otherworldly senses, but they’re not superheroes, they’re marine mammals! Bottlenose dolphins are as famous for their playful nature as they are for their impressive intelligence. In fact, researchers have recently discovered that they “smile” at one another (or do the dolphin equivalent, anyway) while playing together. These incredible animals also have some of the strangest evolutionary history of any mammal.
 
Dolphins didn’t always live in the ocean—at least, their ancestors didn’t. Unlike many other large ocean animals, like sharks, dolphins aren’t fish, but mammals. They’re warm-blooded, have hair (not a lot, but some), give birth to live young, feed their young with milk, and breathe air. That last feature might make a life at sea seem like a strange choice, but it worked quite well for dolphins. The fossil record shows that, around 50 million years ago, dolphins’ terrestrial, four-legged, canine-like ancestors found the ocean to be a great source of food, and began spending more and more time there. Over millions of years, they lost most of their fur, their legs turned to flippers, and their bodies became streamlined for water travel. But many of their ancestors’ characteristics remain: bottlenose dolphins’ namesake snouts still have the same overall shape as their ancestors’ muzzles. Dolphins’ spines and ribs are still positioned in basically the same way their ancestors’ were, which means that they swim with an “up and down” motion rather than the “side to side” gait that fish have. This spinal position, and the fact that bottlenose dolphins retained their ancestors’ flexible necks, means that they can leap high out of the water and make extremely tight turns while swimming.
 
Recent research has shown that bottlenose dolphins use body language, as well as a complex series of vocalizations, to communicate. Open-mouthed facial expressions seem to serve a purpose similar to smiling, as dolphins often make such expressions while playing. It’s also been discovered that dolphins can sense weak electrical signals, thereby using Earth’s naturally occurring magnetic fields to navigate long distances in the open ocean. Bottlenose dolphins are so intelligent that those in captivity can learn complex series of words and commands. In fact, studies have shown that dolphins can not only problem solve but also recognize themselves in mirrors, making them one of the few known animals that are self-aware. This makes it all the more tragic that bottlenose dolphins are often killed when they become tangled in waste from the commercial fishing industry. It’s estimated that some 300,000 whales and dolphins die each year after coming into contact with nets and other fishing debris. It’s a good reason to eat fish from brands committed to ethical fishing practices, and to clean up after yourself when out at sea. Surely you’d rather have the dolphins smile at you than frown.

 
[Image description: A bottlenose dolphin swims with its upper body out of the water.] Credit & copyright: Rene~dawiki, Wikimedia Commons. This work has been released into the public domain by its author, Rene, at the English Wikipedia project. This applies worldwide.

You can’t live with them, and you can’t live without them. So many of our essential electronic devices run on rechargeable lithium-ion batteries, but they have an annoying habit of not doing the one thing they’re supposed to: holding a charge. Fortunately, researchers at Stanford University may have discovered the cause of this irritating phenomenon, according to a paper published in Science. Lithium-ion batteries are relatively simple, using anodes and cathodes to store lithium ions. When the ions move between the two oppositely charged electrodes through an electrolyte, the resulting chemical reaction creates a charge by freeing up electrons. But if that’s all there was to it, lithium-ion batteries wouldn’t lose capacity and energy as quickly as they do, even when they’re not in use. The culprits, it seems, are hydrogen protons which are released into the cathode, breaking down electrolyte molecules with the help of electrons and leaking through the cathode. Hydrogen has long been suspected of causing these issues, but it was difficult to know for sure, since hydrogen atoms are pretty much everywhere and hard to isolate in a lithium-ion battery. So, researchers instead used deuterium, a heavier isotope of hydrogen, that was easier to track. When deuterium was introduced into a battery, they found the exact amount of charge loss they expected from hydrogen. Maybe it’s problems like these that keep hydrogen from being considered a noble gas!

[Image description: A selection of batteries arranged in a triangle, seen from above.] Credit & copyright: mohamed abdelghaffar, Pexels
 

That’s not a raccoon…but it’s not too far off from one either. Coatimundis, or coatis, as they’re commonly called, are members of the family Procyonidae, which also includes raccoons. You won’t find these ring-tailed mammals digging through garbage cans, though. Coatis are rainforest dwellers, and some of the things they eat are a lot more dangerous than trash—like tarantulas, for example.
 
Coatis are around the same size as their raccoon cousins, reaching lengths between 33 and 44 inches, and weighing between 4.4 and 15.9 pounds. Active during the day, coatis avoid predators by climbing, which they excel at. In fact, coatis can rotate their ankles more than 180 degrees, allowing them to descend trees headfirst. When they’re on the ground, coatis use their long snouts to overturn logs and dig through fallen leaves to find their favorite foods: fallen fruit, small reptiles, and insects. Prey doesn’t always go down without a fight, though. Coatis sometimes face off against venomous snakes, which they are nimble enough to outmaneuver and kill. Tarantulas present two problems: not only do the spiders have a venomous bite, they’re also covered in irritating hairs that stick into an attacker's skin, causing itching and pain. Tarantulas even kick their own legs in order to disperse the hairs onto potential enemies. Coatis have a novel way of dealing with this. They simply snatch tarantulas from the forest floor and rub the spiders vigorously between the thickened palms of their front feet, or “hands.” This rubs off the irritating hairs and kills the spiders at the same time, making for an easy meal.
 
That’s not to say that coatis are invulnerable. They have plenty of their own predators, from big cats, like jaguars, to birds of prey. To stay safe, coatis use the buddy system…at least for part of their lives. Females live in groups along with their offspring, but males become solitary once they reach sexual maturity. This makes them easier targets for predators, but also makes it easier to spread out and claim territory and females of their own. When you spend your days fighting tarantulas and snakes, it’s understandable to not want to fight amongst yourselves.

 
[Image description: A ring tailed coatimundis sniffing the ground.] Credit & copyright: Vassil, Wikimedia Commons

An immortal hydra that spreads death and disease? Sounds like something from Greek mythology, but it’s the subject of serious scientific research. According to a paper published in Nature Communications, researchers at the French National Centre for Scientific Research (CNRS) are using species related to jellyfish that can spread cancer between each other to learn more about other types of transmissible cancer. Named Hydra oligactis, the freshwater creature resembles a small worm with many appendages sticking out of it from one end. Thanks to its ability to repair its own DNA, the species is more or less immortal in that it doesn’t die of old age. It also reproduces asexually, essentially cloning itself by growing and releasing buds that develop into other individuals. They have another curious trait: when overfed in a lab, they rapidly develop tumors which can be transmitted to their clone offspring. This isn’t the only case of transmissible cancer, though. Notably, the Tasmanian devil population is struggling with two kinds of contagious cancers, but it’s otherwise very rare. Very little is known about the mechanisms behind cancer transmission, but thanks to the hydras, that may change soon. The researchers at CNRS wrote, "Using Hydra oligactis, which exhibits spontaneous tumor development that in some strains became vertically transmitted, this study presents the first experimental observation of the evolution of a transmissible tumor. This work, therefore, makes the first contribution to understanding the conditions of transmissible cancer emergence and their short-term consequences for the host." It’s one of the few cases where professionals want to see cancer grow.

[Image description: A black-and-white illustration of a Hydra polyp, which looks like a worm with many tendrils.] Credit & copyright: Abraham Trembley/Pierre Lyonnet, 1744. Wikimedia Commons. This work is in the public domain in its country of origin and other countries and areas where the copyright term is the author's life plus 70 years or fewer.
 

She’s an icon, she’s a diva, she’s a hippo. If you’ve been on social media in recent months, you’ve almost certainly seen at least one post about the adorable baby pygmy hippo named Moo Deng. Born this July at Khao Kheow Open Zoo in Si Racha, Chonburi province, Thailand, Moo Deng has done more than take the internet by storm; she’s raised public awareness about her highly endangered species.
 
As their name suggests, pygmy hippopotamuses are much smaller than their common hippopotamus cousins. Common hippopotamuses stand around 5.2 feet tall and can reach lengths of up to 16.5 feet with females weighing up to 3,000 pounds and males weighing up to 9,000 or more. Compared to that, an average pygmy hippo standing three feet tall with a length of around 6 feet and a weight of around 600 pounds seems quite petite. But it isn’t just their size that makes pygmy hippos unusual. While common hippos spend most of their life in water, pygmy hippos are better suited for life on land. They have fewer webbed toes than their larger counterparts and are therefore poorer swimmers. Still, they like to wade in water and often live near lakes and rivers. Like common hippos, pygmy hippos can’t sweat, but their skin does secret a reddish substance called “blood sweat” which acts as a natural sunscreen, ensuring that their mostly-hairless bodies don’t get burned. It’s thought that pygmy hippos and common hippos shared a common ancestor, and that the two species diverged from one another around 10 million years ago.
 
Wild pygmy hippos live in tropical lowland forests in northwestern Africa, where they eat a vegetarian diet of fallen fruit, broad-leafed plants, and grasses.
Unfortunately, habitat loss has led them to become critically endangered, and today there are only around 3,000 pygmy hippos left in the wild. Conservationists are doing their best to work with governments to pass regulations that create protected areas for pygmy hippos. Of course, public awareness always helps—for now, we can leave that part to Moo Deng.

 
[Image description: A mother and baby pygmy hippo standing by water in a zoo enclosure.] Credit & copyright: Mistvan, Wikimedia Commons. This work has been released into the public domain by its author, Mistvan. This applies worldwide.

It might not have killed the dinosaurs, but it killed just about everything else. The Permian extinction was the greatest mass extinction event in Earth’s history, yet the cause of it wasn’t fully understood until now. Also called the Permian-Triassic extinction event or simply “the Great Dying,” it occurred at the end of the Permian period over 250 million years ago. Scientists have known for a while that a series of massive volcanic eruptions spewed greenhouse gasses into the atmosphere at the time, causing the climate to change rapidly. They also knew that this caused the oceans to heat up, killing off most of the late Permian period’s marine life. Around 90 percent of marine life and 75 percent of life on land disappeared, paving the way for an explosion of new species in the Triassic period. Now, researchers from China, the U.K., Germany, and Austria have published a paper placing the blame on a series of “mega El Niños” caused by climate change. Typically, even when global temperatures get warmer, many lifeforms can survive by migrating or retreating to cooler areas. However, when the researchers used a paleoclimate modeling to recreate what the weather would have been like during the Great Dying, they found that there were El Niños constantly disrupting weather patterns, causing cool areas to become warm and warm areas to cool down. As the periods of intense heat and reduced sunlight from volcanic ash in the atmosphere killed off carbon-capturing vegetation, the cycle increased in intensity. Eventually, it got hot everywhere and there was simply nowhere to go to stay cool. Just thinking about that kind of heat sends chills down our spines.

[Image description: A 1984 photo of erupting volcanic vents spewing red lava into the air.] Credit & copyright: NPGallery, Wikimedia Commons. NPS photo, accession number: ba440a24-2eec-4d85-ae08-f38115246835. This image or media file contains material based on a work of a National Park Service employee, created as part of that person's official duties. As a work of the U.S. federal government, such work is in the public domain in the United States. NP Gallery lists as copyright free.
 

They may not be the best-looking creatures, but it’s no skin off their hairless backs. Naked mole rats aren’t just strange looking, they also live, breed, and age differently than almost every other mammal on Earth.
 
Naked mole rats are neither moles nor rats, though they are rodents. They only grow to be around three inches long, yet they’re more closely related to large rodents like porcupines than they are to rats. Around 31 million years ago, they diverged from other mole rats found in Africa, and evolved into their current, hairless form. Today, they’re the only hairless mole rats in the world. Like other mole rats, naked mole rats are mostly blind and live underground, in colonies of up to 80 individuals. Their social structure is more similar to that of insects like bees and ants than it is to most other mammals. Naked mole rats have just one breeding pair per colony, and workers help take care of the young, just like in an ant colony or beehive.
 
The strangeness doesn’t end there. For reasons still not fully understood, naked mole rats seem to defy the aging process in several odd ways. First, most female mammals begin life with a certain number of eggs that eventually run out, leaving them infertile. But naked mole rats never run out of egg cells, meaning that they can give birth until they die. Speaking of death, naked mole rats have managed to dodge one of the most common causes of death in other mammalian species: cancer. While the mechanism behind their resilience is still being studied, it may have to do with cellular senescence, a phenomenon in which damaged cells stop dividing—thus stopping them from growing into tumors. This cellular resiliency may also be why naked mole rats never show many signs of aging—they don’t develop arthritis, lose energy, or become confused as they grow older. In fact, naked mole rats’ main cause of death in the wild is predation. No wonder they’re the world’s longest-lived rodents, able to reach 30 years of age. Clearly, beauty isn’t everything!

 
[Image description: A naked mole rat eating a seed held in its front paws.] Credit & copyright: Trisha M Shears (Ltshears), Wikimedia Commons. The copyright holder of this work has released it into the public domain. This applies worldwide.

Bat deaths are an ecological disaster; infant deaths are tragedies. But how can these two things be related? A researcher at the University of Chicago recently published a paper in Science linking the continuing decline of the bat population in New England to a rise in infant mortality rates in the region. It sounds almost like a non sequitur, but environmental economist Eyal Frank, the author of the paper, believes there’s a compelling link. For decades, bat colonies have been succumbing en masse to a deadly fungal disease called white nose syndrome. Since bats can consume about 40 percent of their own body per night in insects, their presence serves as a natural form of pest control. However, with lower bat populations, farmers in areas affected by white nose syndrome have been using 31 percent more pesticides on average to compensate. Frank found that these areas also began to see an increase in the infant mortality rate by eight percent, or about 1,300 deaths so far. While the numbers have a correlation (a statistical relationship) to each other, it doesn’t yet prove causation (that one event caused the other).
 
According to Tracey Woodruff, an environmental health scientist at the University of California San Francisco who was not involved with the study, there are a number of other factors that may have led to the increase in infant mortality, such as air pollution. Also, Frank’s paper didn’t find a correlation between the pesticide use and birth weight, which is often correlated with infant mortality. On the other hand, Frank has factored in issues like opioid use, unemployment, and GMOs, and found nothing else that could explain the rise in infant deaths. They say that numbers don’t lie, but this is one instance where you’d almost hope they do.

[Image description: A little brown bat hanging upside down, with white fungus growing on its nose and mouth.] Credit & copyright: Marvin Moriarty/USFWS, Wikimedia Commons. This image or recording is the work of a U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service employee, taken or made as part of that person's official duties. As a work of the U.S. federal government, the image is in the public domain.
 

Do dinosaurs still walk among us? It may sound like a question for bigfoot hunters and Nessie enthusiasts, but scientifically speaking, the answer is (sort of) yes. Birds, after all, are direct, living descendants of dinosaurs, and no bird illustrates this fact more plainly than the cassowary. These massive, flightless birds, with their head crests and bright coloring, look like something straight out of Jurassic Park. Rather than running from them in terror, though, people all over the world are doing their best to save this endangered creature. In fact, a bird park in England’s Cotswolds region, called Birdland, recently made international headlines when a cassowary chick was born there. Cassowaries rarely breed in captivity—in fact, it took 25 years for a chick to be born at Birdland, and it’s only the fourth cassowary to ever be hatched in Europe. It goes to show the importance of saving cassowaries’ native habitat, the rainforests of Australia, New Guinea, and their surrounding islands.
 
Cassowaries are the third largest birds in the world, standing up to six feet tall and weighing as much as 175 pounds. Their bodies and wings are covered in shaggy, black feathers, while distinctive, bright blue heads and necks are bare. Both males and females have head crests, known as casques, which are thought to help them shed excess heat. While cassowaries’ ancient ancestors were velociraptor-like dinosaurs, around 60 million years ago these evolved into birds in the order Struthioniformes, the only living member of which is the ostrich. It was just 10 million years ago that cassowaries broke away from the Struthioniformes order and began changing into the colorful birds they are today. The three living species of cassowary are now members of the order Casuariiformes, along with emus.
 
Despite their fearful appearance, strong legs, and wickedly sharp talons, cassowaries primarily eat fruit, including black palm berries and figs. While cassowaries are omnivores and do hunt, their prey consists mostly of small rodents and reptiles. While cassowary breeding habits remain somewhat mysterious, they are typically thought to mate between June and October. They lay clutches of three to five eggs, which hatch into fuzzy, yellow-and-brown-striped chicks. The chicks may look drab compared to adult cassowaries, but they do hatch from bright green eggs. It seems these birds can’t help but live colorful lives, right from the beginning.

 
[Image description: A cassowary standing in thick, green brush. It is a large, flightless bird with a blue neck and head, a black body, and a brown head crest.] Credit & copyright: Dave Kimble, Wikimedia Commons. The copyright holder of this work has released this work into the public domain. This applies worldwide.

No need to pan for gold, let the planet shake it out for you. Despite being one of the world’s most sought-after metals, the details of how small gold particles form into large nuggets has long baffled scientists. Equally puzzling was why large nuggets and veins of gold are usually found clinging to quartz, one of Earth’s most common minerals. Now, scientists from Monash University in Australia have detailed a new theory: that earthquakes and quartz may work together to form large nuggets of gold. The idea, outlined in a recent issue of the journal Nature Geoscience, states that the vast pressure earthquakes exert on quartz activates a special property of the mineral called piezoelectricity. This occurs when some materials, including quartz, emit an electrical charge under mechanical stress. This charge makes it easier for gold nanoparticles in fluid beneath the Earth’s crust to gather on the surface of quartz, since it changes the arrangement of charged atoms inside the quartz, thereby allowing gold nanoparticles to “stick” to the mineral more easily. Researchers tested their theory in a lab by placing quartz in a fluid that contained gold nanoparticles. When they modeled the type of electrical field that quartz would produce during an earthquake, the quartz produced a charge that caused the gold nanoparticles to build up on its surface. It seems that, even while toppling buildings, earthquakes leave behind some precious surprises in the form of precious metal.

[Image description: Gold forming on a nugget of quartz.] Credit & copyright: Miguel Calvo, Wikimedia Commons. This file is made available under the Creative Commons CC0 1.0 Universal Public Domain Dedication.
 

This is no mere cat…it’s a meerkat! These weasel-like members of the mongoose family display some of the most unique behavior in the animal kingdom. Social and intelligent, especially for mammals of their size, meerkats hunt, work, and live together in large groups called mobs.
 
Meerkats are small mammals, standing just under 12 inches tall and weighing around two pounds. Yet, like their closest relatives, what they lack in size they make up for in scrappiness. With their ability to stand on two legs and run nimbly on all fours, meerkats can outmaneuver many predators. Those they can’t outrun must contend with meerkats’ long claws and sharp teeth. Like other mongooses, meerkats are resistant to some forms of venom. This trait comes in very handy since there are 30 species of venomous snakes in meerkats’ home country of Africa. However, snakes aren’t meerkats’ biggest predators. That distinction falls to birds of prey, like hawks and eagles, which can snatch meerkats from above before they can defend themselves. Large, terrestrial carnivores, like jackals and hyenas, are too big to fight off. To protect against these threats, meerkats have evolved a brilliant social system with built-in babysitters, lookouts, and secret escape routes.
 
Meerkat mobs include around 10 to 15 meerkats, and are made up of about three family groups, each with a breeding pair and their own young, called pups. Mobs dig elaborate systems of tunnels and underground dens, and spend most of their lives within a few hundred feet of these safe havens. Meerkat burrows can have 15 or more openings, allowing them to slip underground at many different points. While one or two meerkats watch the mob’s young while other adults stand lookout. If a predator is spotted, the guard will sound an alarm call, which sends the entire mob racing underground. During calmer times, adults will groom one another, sun themselves, and teach pups how to dig up prey, which includes insects like grubs, beetles, and even scorpions and snakes—it really does pay to be immune to venom.

 
[Image description: Two adult meerkats and five young meerkats standing at attention. One adult is looking to the right, the others are facing forward.] Credit & copyright: Amada44, Wikimedia Commons. The copyright holder of this work, has released it into the public domain. This applies worldwide.

They say you eat with your eyes first. That’s all the more true when you’re at the grocery store looking at a bag of oranges. Food producers have long known that oranges wrapped in red netting look more, well…orange. That makes them appear riper and more appealing to buyers. Recently, a psychologist from Giessen University in Germany described exactly how this optical illusion works, according to a paper published in i-Perception. It turns out, when grocery stores sell oranges in red netting, limes in green and lemons in yellow, they’re not just color coordinating for the sake of cuteness. Rather, they’re taking advantage of the “confetti illusion” to change the way shoppers perceive the color of the products. In the past, it wasn’t clear how this illusion worked, with some suggesting that it had to do with the way light reflects off the material of the colored netting in a 3D environment. Instead, according to Karl Gegenfurtner of Giessen University, it’s a matter of how the human brain processes color. He found that even in a 2D image, if colored bars were placed across an object, it would change the appearance of that object’s color. For example, a human face with green bars placed evenly over it will appear to have yellowish-green skin. Gegenfurtner believes that this may be because the human brain receives visual information in pieces that it then has to assemble. With colored netting, the fine, high-contrast details affect the brain’s ability to perform a part of this process which he calls “color assimilation.” So, if you feel you can’t trust your eyes at the grocery store, it’s really not your fault. Maybe it’s time to start buying your oranges one at a time.

 
[Image description: Oranges arranged into many rows on top of each other.] Credit & copyright: Engin Akyurt, Pexels
 

This cat may be small, but not small enough to sneak past hidden cameras. Conservationists in Arizona are celebrating after wildlife cameras in their state captured something truly remarkable: an ocelot. These small, spotted wildcats used to roam some parts of the southern United States, and a small population still exists in the wilderness of southern Texas. These days, though, ocelots are mostly found in the protective cover of Mexican and South American rainforests. That’s why the Arizona find was so extraordinary. It seems these felines may be making a bit of a comeback in the U.S.
 
Ocelots are thought to have gotten their unusual name from the Aztec word “tlalocelot”, meaning “field tiger.” They’re certainly nowhere near the size of tigers, though. The largest ocelots only reach lengths of around 3.25 feet and weigh around 34 pounds. Being small might seem like a disadvantage for a wild predator, but ocelots’ size actually serves them quite well. In a rainforest dense with vegetation, it pays to be too small to get tangled up in vines and debris when chasing prey. A smaller body also means that ocelots need less food to fuel themselves. This gives them better odds of survival in lean times than many other, larger predators enjoy. Being small also means that ocelots can fill up on petite-sized prey, which is abundant in rainforests and is much less dangerous to hunt than larger prey. Ocelots can make a feast of rodents, small birds, and even large insects.
 
Ocelots have striking spotted fur, the exact pattern of which is unique to each individual cat. The spots help them blend into the dappled light of forests and sneak up on unsuspecting prey. Unfortunately, it has also led them to be hunted throughout most of human history, starting with the Aztecs who gave the cats their name. It takes over 30 ocelot pelts to make a single human-sized garment, so ocelot hunting ran rampant in South America, Mexico, and the United States for centuries. Things got particularly bad in the 1960s and 70s, when ocelots in the U.S. were practically wiped out. In 1982, the government finally stepped in and declared ocelots an endangered species, but the cats have still been scarce in the U.S. for the past few decades. Maybe the recent Arizona footage is a sign that ocelots are finally willing to return to their old stomping grounds. What say we let them keep their coats this time?

 
[Image description: An 1896 sketch of an ocelot with tropical trees in the background.] Credit & copyright: Wyman & Sons Limited, Lloyd's Natural History: "A hand-book to the Carnivora. Part 1, Cats, civets, and mungoose"[1] by Richard Lydekker. 1896. Wikimedia Commons. This work is in the public domain in its country of origin and other countries and areas where the copyright term is the author's life plus 70 years or fewer.

Is it too good to be true or could it be a viral success? Researchers at Northeastern University claim that they’ve discovered an antibody that could potentially provide protection against SARS-CoV-2…and all its variants. That sounds like the stuff of science fiction, but it may be possible. The CDC has announced that the virus is now endemic, meaning it’s here to stay. Part of what makes SARS-CoV-2 so hard to contain is its penchant for mutating rapidly, developing resistances to vaccines and coming back in waves. However, researchers have now found an antibody called CV3-25, which naturally occurs in some people, that might shut down the virus no matter how many times it mutates. Coronaviruses like SARS-CoV-2 get their name for the spike proteins on the outside, which resemble a crown, or corona. These spike proteins are responsible for allowing the virus to bind to human cells. The most important part of the spike protein (and the part that keeps changing) is called the receptor binding domain (RBD). CV3-25, though, doesn’t care what the RBD looks like—as long as there’s a spike protein for it to disable, it will. Researchers say that instead of developing new vaccines for every new viral strain, it may be possible to create a single vaccine based on this antibody to provide lasting protection. That’s extra good news for anyone who hates needles.

[Image description: Three medical needles against a yellow background.] Credit & copyright: Karolina Kaboompics, Pexels
 

Keep your distance, this beetle’s packing heat! There are over 500 species of bombardier beetle, but they’ve all got one thing in common: an incredible chemical weapon. When these beetles are threatened, they shoot a mix of scalding, toxic chemicals from their abdomens, heated up to a blistering 212 degrees Fahrenheit. The beetle’s defense is so awe-inspiring that some have even insisted it could not have evolved naturally. In reality, bombardier beetles pull off their amazing feat using chemicals already present in their—and many other insects’—bodies.
 
Bombardier beetles’ noxious spray is a mix of hydrogen peroxide and hydroquinone. Hydroquinone is common in many insects, as the compound makes their exoskeletons harder. Bombardier beetles aren’t the only insects to harness this chemical for defense, either. Millipedes, spiders, and many other species of beetles secret hydroquinone from their exoskeletons when under threat, as the chemical’s foul taste and smell deters predators. Hydrogen peroxide is produced by many living things, not just insects, as a simple byproduct of cellular respiration. Instead of secreting a bit of hydroquinone and using enzymes to break down excess hydrogen peroxide, as most other insects do, bombardier beetles evolved an elaborate “firing” system. The chemicals are stored in separate sacs inside the beetle’s body, then mixed in a chamber near the back of the abdomen before being let loose in a volley of “shots.” The mixed chemicals cause an exothermic reaction—in other words, energy from the reaction is transferred to the beetle’s surroundings in the form of intense heat. Yet, the beetle never hurts itself with its own chemicals—since the chemicals are released in pulses, the chamber has time to cool down in between “shots”, saving the beetle’s insides. Praying mantises and other insects are almost always driven away by bombardier beetle attacks. Toads are a bigger problem for the beetles, since they’re big enough to swallow them before the bombardier can fire a shot. Of course, they usually vomit the beetles right back up when the chemical explosion happens in their throats or stomachs. When you’re the size of an insect, it pays to be armed.

 
[Image description: An orange beetle with a dark green body against a white background.] Credit & copyright: Francisco Welter-Schultes, Wikimedia Commons. This file is made available under the Creative Commons CC0 1.0 Universal Public Domain Dedication.

Who’d ever think that dust could make a place more hospitable? Oddly, that might be the case on Mars. Scientists at Northwestern University and University of Chicago in Illinois have proposed a novel way to potentially terraform Mars using rod-shaped particles that trap heat, according to a paper published in Science Advances. Making Mars habitable has been thrown about as an idea for a while, but it has mostly stayed in the realm of science fiction. After all, anything capable of adequately transforming the Red Planet’s atmosphere would need to be transported in immense quantities over a vast distance at an enormous expense. For example, one older idea involves building factories that produce massive amounts of chlorofluorocarbons or CFCs, but that would require a trillion tons of fluorine, which isn’t exactly abundant on Mars. Another possible method involves introducing particulates that trap solar radiation to warm up the Martian surface, but again the issue is the availability of adequate materials. However, Samaneh Ansari at Northwestern University in Illinois and his colleagues have proposed a new idea: produce nanorods using materials that make up much of the Red Planet’s dusty surface: iron and aluminum. The idea is to place 3D printers on Mars that would create nanorods that are just nine microns long, which would then be carried into the air by focused sunlight reflected from mirrors. Once they made their way into the atmosphere, the nanorods would reduce the wavelength of thermal radiation by half, allowing it to be absorbed more readily by the planet’s surface. In all, it could raise the temperature of Mars by 50 degrees Fahrenheit. Unfortunately, it won’t do much to change the composition of the atmosphere, which is mostly carbon dioxide. So, if you’re thinking of picnicking on Martian sands, don’t hold your breath.

[Image description: A dark sky with stars visible.] Credit & copyright: Kai Pilger, Pexels
 

A well-preserved worm doesn’t sound like a great find, but it actually describes one of the most significant biological discoveries in recent memory. Researchers at Durham University have found the fossilized remains of a worm-like organism that is shedding much-needed light on evolutionary history, according to a paper published in the journal Nature. The worm-like creature belongs to a clade of organisms known as euarthropods and was discovered in the Chinese province of Yunnan. Though it’s only about the size of a poppy seed, the fossil is 520 million years old and has unusually well-preserved internal organs. Dubbed Youti yuanshi, the creature could be an early ancestor of arthropods that are still around today. These include arachnids, crustaceans, and insects. Researchers used synchrotron X-ray tomography to get a clear look at the creature’s minuscule internal organs, creating an accurate model that shows its brain, digestive glands, and the structure of its legs. These anatomical features aren’t quite the same as those of its descendants, and that’s what’s so significant about them. Scientists have previously struggled to understand the steps required for simple, worm-like organisms to evolve into more complex ones like crabs or spiders, and the fossil of the Y. yuanshi has more or less provided a blueprint. For example, the larvae’s proto-cerebrum brain region might have later evolved into part of the segmented heads found in arthropods like crabs. The worm also showed the researchers that ancient organisms like Y. yuanshi were much more complex than previously thought, and have been around much longer. It’s one can of worms that any scientist would be glad to open.

[Image description: A close-up photo of a red-and-white Sally Lightfoot Crab.] Credit & copyright: Nosferattus, Wikimedia Commons. This file is made available under the Creative Commons CC0 1.0 Universal Public Domain Dedication.
 

Welcome to a new Wednesday tradition: critter curios! We’ll be examining some of the strangest and most interesting animals in the world, starting with the largest lizard on Earth. While Komodo dragons don’t breathe fire, they more than live up to their namesake. These behemoths can reach lengths of over 10 feet and weigh over 150 pounds. They can bring down prey even larger than themselves thanks to a unique hunting style that relies on venom and, it was recently discovered, on iron-coated teeth.
 
As their name suggests, Komodo dragons live only on the Indonesian group of islands that includes the Island of Komodo. Other islands there include Rintja, Padar and Flores. They’re not actually native to these islands, though. Rather, as part of the monitor lizard family Varanidae, they are thought to have evolved in Australia around three to four million years ago. Based on fossils of other enormous, extinct monitor lizards in Australia, some scientists believe that Komodo dragons grew to their huge size in order to hunt the large, Australian megafauna of the day. As for how the lizards ended up in Indonesia, it’s likely they simply swam as their population boomed and competition for food pushed them ever westward. Komodo dragon fossils from around one million years ago have been found on the Island of Flores. These ancient Komodo dragons likely hunted creatures like giant rats, tortoises, and an extinct species of pygmy elephant known as Stegodon.
 
Today, Komodo dragons will eat anything they can get their mouths on. That includes small insects and birds when they’re young, and enormous animals like water buffalo once they reach adulthood. Though they can run an impressive 12 miles per hour, they don’t rely on speed to catch prey. Instead, they sneak close enough to bite their prey, usually on the leg, tearing open a large wound. Then, they wait. Komodo dragons will follow their limping prey for days if necessary, until the unlucky animal finally dies. For a long time, it was thought that Komodo dragons killed their prey via bacteria in their saliva, but in 2009 it was discovered that these lizards do, indeed, have venom that causes their prey’s flesh to rot away over time. In order to eat animals as large and muscular as water buffalo, Komodo dragons have another useful adaptation: iron-coated teeth. Iron in their enamel keeps their teeth from blunting over time, so they’re always able to shred through flesh. Their hunting style may seem macabre, but it's worked for these predators for millions of years. Let’s see an iguana do that!

 
[Image description: A close-up photo of a komodo dragon’s face.] Credit & copyright: Wikimedia Commons, MRPlotz. This file is made available under the Creative Commons CC0 1.0 Universal Public Domain Dedication.