News by Subject Agriculture

Aggressiveness among animals may increase the longer individuals live together in stable groups. This is the finding of a recent study carried out by researchers from the Leibniz-Institute of Freshwater Ecology and Inland Fisheries. The study, published in the journal Animal Behaviour used the Amazon molly, a naturally clonal fish species that produces genetically identical individuals to isolate the effects of familiarity on behavior.

Researchers from the University of Konstanz, the University of California-Los Angeles, Tel Aviv University and the Inter-University Institute for Marine Sciences in Eilat gain new in-sights into how phenotypic complexity influences diversification among Lake Malawi cichlid fish.

Scientists at the Max Planck Institute for Plant Breeding Research in Cologne have revealed that direct physical associations between plant immune proteins and fungal molecules are widespread during attempted infection. The authors' findings run counter to current thinking and may have important implications for engineering disease resistance in crop species.

A researcher searching the shoreline of the Panama Canal for fossil plants instead found an ancient sea cow. An 'emergency fossil excavation' due to rising water levels yielded a remarkably complete skeleton of a new genus and species of dugong, estimated to be about 20 million years old, the first evidence of a marine mammal from the Pacific side of the canal.

A new study from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill reports that protecting coral reefs from fishing and pollution does not help coral populations cope with climate change. The study also concludes that ocean warming is the primary cause of the global decline of reef-building corals and that the only effective solution is to immediately and drastically reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

The Atlantic cod is one of the most important commercial fish species in the world. Recent studies have shown that ocean acidification threatens the early life stages of this species. So far it was hoped that at least the larvae that survive might be more robust and therefore may aid in the adaptation of this population. A new paper, which has been published by scientists from GEOMAR in the journal Global Change Biology, suggests otherwise.