Imagine taking a nap at a time when woolly mammoths roamed the plains… and then waking up in the twenty-first century. That may sound like a science fiction story, but it might be the real experience of tiny aquatic animals called rotifers. …

From the article: "In a paper published in Science, biologists at Baylor College of Medicine, the Netherlands Cancer Institute and Rice University studying the tree of life unveil a new classification system for cell nuclei and the discovery of a method for transmuting one type of cell nucleus into …

Creeping voles (Microtus oregoni) are … odd…

This synthesis of the paper was sanctioned by the original author, pace Kaeli on Twitter. Even if you’re pretty much willing to take that top-level conclusion on faith, it’s interesting to read about the experimental design. …

Nature is so much weirder than people give her credit for. Anyway, if you’re ever looking for cuter examples than lizards for your “actually sex isn’t that simple” arguments, consider these guys? …

The paper, hastily and badly summarised

The authors describe and extensively document how a Raspberry Pi can be used to, for example, study how fruit flies react to light. Why is this interesting? It provides ways to build a system that can react to the subject’s changes in behaviour using a ve…