News by Subject Biology

A longstanding obstacle to the market for bovine embryos is about to be removed. Researchers have described a hitherto unknown mechanism of lipid accumulation in oocytes that limits the success of in vitro production of bovine embryos.

Decades of research has shown that apes, in spite of their proverbial aping abilities, are rather poor imitators, especially when compared to human children. Current theories hold that apes are worse imitators because they lack this social and communicative side of imitation. A new study from Lund University, published in the journal Primates, has instead targeted the interactive side of imitation directly, and finds that the divide between humans and chimpanzees is less clear cut.

Standard behavior experiments to investigate behavior in popular lab animals only incompletely mimic natural conditions. The understanding of behavior and brain function is thus limited. Virtual Reality helps in generating a more natural experimental environment but requires immobilization of the animal, disrupting sensorimotor experience and causing altered neuronal and behavioral responses. Researchers have now developed a VR system for freely moving animals to overcome most of these limitations.

Fish are expected to shrink in size by 20 to 30 per cent if ocean temperatures continue to climb due to climate change.

Human interference in the deep sea could already be outpacing our basic understanding of how it functions. As a result, without increased research and an immediate review of deep ocean conservation measures, the creatures that live there face an uncertain future, Oxford University scientists have warned.

Inspired by Star Trek, biologists are enabling new experiments in virtual reality.

As conditions warm, fish and wildlife living at the southern edge of their species' ranges are most at risk, according to Penn State researchers who led a major collaborative study of how wood frogs are being affected by climate change.

Cystoisospora suis causes diarrhea especially in newborn piglets and spreads quickly across farms. European farmers preventively use toltrazuril to control parasite development. In contrast to congeneric chicken parasites, no resistance to toltrazuril was described in pig parasites until recently. Researchers of Vetmeduni Vienna now confirmed ineffectivness of toltrazuril against a Dutch isolate. Although the resistance develops slowly, monitoring should be intensified due to the lack of alternative treatment options and hygiene measures should be increased.