Wonderful Things: Leaping Fish Spends Entire Life on Land
This is the sixth post in the “Wonderful Things” series. The next time you feel like a fish out of water, think of the Pacific leaping blenny.
Stories by Jennifer Frazer
On the Curious Motions of Syphilis and Lyme Disease Bacteria
The bacteria that cause syphilis and Lyme Disease have something extraordinary in common: they manage to propel themselves through their environment in spite of the fact their tails are located inside their bodies...
My Interview on the Pacific Northwest Cryptococcus Outbreak on SCPR
I have just a quick update today as I’m working on a long blog post for this weekend. Last week I gave an interview for the Southern California Public Radio show “Take Two” on my feature story in this month’s issue of Scientific American on the outbreak of the yeast Cryptococcus gattii among people living [...]..
Wonderful Things: The Pugnacious, Alien-esque Skeleton Shrimp
This is the fifth post in the Wonderful Things series. This creature is not an insect, nor something you need to worry about exploding from your chest.
Strange Fungi Now Stalk Healthy People
A strange fungal disease in Canada and the U.S. heralds a new threat to human health
You Know You Want To Help (6-Legged) Monarchs. Here’s How.
Last year, a hard year by monarch butterfly migration standards, 60 million monarchs showed up at their misty wintering grounds in Mexico. This year, so far, a mere 3 million have straggled in — and late, too, according to a disturbing must-read piece (“The Year the Monarch Didn’t Appear”) published last Friday in the New [...]..
Accident of Evolution Allows Fungi to Thrive in Our Bodies
Cryptococcal fungi have evolved mechanisms for eluding their protist predators, giving them an inadvertent advantage over look-alike immune cells in humans, porpoises and other mammals
Fungi on the March: My New Feature Story for Scientific American
Healthy humans are strangely impervious to fatal fungi. It usually takes something like a shot in the spine with a contaminated drug to give fungi the necessary upper hand.
How Your Morning Commute Resembles a Fungus
In many fungi, the DNA storage compartments called nuclei are not prisoners of the cells they reside in, the way they are in animals and plants.
How the Mosses That Got Run Over By a Glacier Survived Their Ordeal
A few months ago, scientists revealed that some plucky mosses in Canada managed to do something long thought impossible: survive a 400-year close encounter with the business end of a glacier, and live to sprout another day...
What Do Vampire Squid Really Eat? Hint: It’s Not Blood
Oxygen-poor zones are not just found off the coast of South America, as we saw last time. “Oxygen minimum zones” may occur throughout the world’s ocean’s at mid-water depths where food consumption is high but supplies of oxygen are low...
Missing Nitrogen May Be Vanishing in the Tubes of Giant Bacteria
Off the coast of Mexico’s Baja Peninsula lies a dark, still, deep place. It is called the Soledad Basin, and in it lies a garden of bacteria so large you can see them with your own eyes...
There’s Darwin’s Fungus!
Last winter I wrote a post called “Darwin’s Neon Golf Balls” about a fungus called Cyttaria that Darwin collected during his journey on the Beagle.
Are Cycads Social Plants?
Botanists have long puzzled over a peculiarity of ancient plants called cycads: they have huge, bright, fleshy seeds displayed in enormous cones.
The Private Life of Plankton — in HD
Artistic, black and white photos of plankton — as we saw last time — are fabulous. But what if one hungers for HD? The Plankton Chronicles have got you covered.
Ever Wanted to Observe and ID Weird Deep Sea Creatures? Here’s Your Chance
If you’re like me, you’ve pondered from time to time the goings-on of life in the deep. What’s happening down there this very moment?
Unexpected Award Phone Call: A Good Way to Start Your Day
Yesterday morning as I was tucking into my first cup of tea, I received the startling news that I’ve won the American Meteorological Society’s Award for Distinguished Science Journalism in the Atmospheric and Related Sciences...
Wonderful Things: The Universe Between the Sand Grains
This is the fourth post in the Wonderful Things series. As we saw last time, the thin strip of sand found on beaches is home to many organisms that can dwell no where else.
Cute Isopod ISO Sweet Beach. Likes: Sand. Dislikes: Grooming
Pandas, lions, and elk and their ilk often find their way onto the covers of conservationists’ marketing materials. But I think relying exclusively on big furry animals (industry codename: charasmatic megafauna) means they are missing out on some potentially awesome spokes-creatures...
Yeast: Making Food Great for 5,000 Years. But What Exactly Is it?
Fire was the first force of nature tamed for cooking. Yeast was second. In the early days of ancient Egypt, around 3100 B.C., there lived a ruler named Scorpion, who probably did not look like The Rock...
