Tiffany Taylor, professor of microbial ecology and evolution at the University of Bath in the U.K., recommends the books that shaped her career and her outlook on life. When you purchase through links ...

"Consciousness," although challenging to define, can be thought of as a first-person awareness of one's surroundings and oneself. You sense the world through your eyes, nose, ears and hands, and track ...

Imagine a photograph of your great-grandparents, grandparents and parents side by side. You’d see a resemblance, but each generation would look distinct from its predecessors. This is the process of ...

The origins of consciousness date back about 540 million years ago, when animal bodies became more complex. Feelings like pleasure and pain act as a "common currency" for decision-making, as we see in ...

Biologists are closing in on a puzzle that seems to turn classic evolutionary logic inside out, yet may be so common that it deserves to be called a new rule of life. Instead of always purging harmful ...

A fish thought to be evolution’s time capsule just surprised scientists. A detailed dissection of the coelacanth — a 400-million-year-old species often called a “living fossil” — revealed that key ...

How did humans become human? Understanding when, where and in what environmental conditions our early ancestors lived is central to solving the puzzle of human evolution. Unfortunately, pinning down a ...

A small tissue fold in fly embryos, once thought purposeless, plays a vital role in stabilizing tissues. Researchers show that it absorbs stress during early development, and its position and timing ...

One hundred years ago a young teacher, John T. Scopes, went on trial in Dayton, Tenn., for violating a recently enacted state law that forbade the state’s educators “to teach any theory that denies ...

Cooking food is one of the activities that makes humanity unique. It's not just about what tastes good: advances in cooking technology have been a constant part of our progress, from the ability to ...