A marvel of the rainforest treetops; the Green Thornytail Iguana (Uracentron azureum). This species is endemic to part of the Guiana shield in the upper part of the Amazon, Suriname and French Guiana. They are rarely seen as they live mainly high up the trees. It will be featured in the upcoming book: The Reptiles of the Guianas (Guyana, Suriname and French Guiana)
🧬 7 years ago, scientists proved that they can shave a cell down to its most basic elements, creating a life form with the smallest genome that allows it to grow and divide in lab.
Recent study proofs that even simplest self-replicating organisms on earth can adapt.
During 300 days of evolution in the lab (the generational equivalent of 40,000 human years), the "minimal cells" regained all the vitality they had sacrificed.
Flower that thrives in Death Valley may hold secret to heat adaptation: Insights into how Death Valley’s Tidestromia oblongifolia tolerates such high temperatures could help researchers to engineer crops that can survive global warming https://archive.is/0I9Vn
Why Do Cats Land on Their Feet? Physics Explains: As it turns out, felines can survive a fall from any height—at least in theory https://archive.is/j55HE
tl;dr: nothing specific to cats. It’s just an exercise of calculating “air friction” and terminal velocity. Same calculation would let a dog survive the fall no different.
Bizarre ‘mind-controlling’ parasitic worm lacks genes found in every known animal: Our world is full of bizarre and intriguing creatures. One of the strangest, though, is the hairworm, a parasitic worm known as a “mind control worm” in some circles. These parasitic worms are found all over the world, and they look similar to thin strands of spaghetti, usually measuring a couple of inches long. However, their bodies and genes hint at the parasitic lifestyle that they live. https://bgr.com/science/bizarre-mind-controlling-parasitic-worm-lacks-genes-found-in-every-known-animal/
Around 2,000 penguins wash up dead on Uruguay coast: Around 2,000 penguins have appeared dead on the coast of eastern Uruguay in the last 10 days, and the cause, which does not appear to be avian influenza, remains a mystery, authorities said. https://phys.org/news/2023-07-penguins-dead-uruguay-coast.html