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Insects

A small cabbage butterfly (Pieris rapae) hovers on a hedge mustard plant (Sisybrium officinale). While the butterfly might look harmless enough, its caterpillars engage in a chemical war with this mustard plant's cultivated relatives.

New Research

Mustard Is A Product Of Evolutionary Warfare Between Plants And Caterpillars

Plants produce mustard oils to fight off pests in a chemical conflict that’s been waged for millions of years

A cereus in Arizona in 2009. These night-blooming flowers spring forth from cacti just one night a year, in concert with other nearby cereus. They usually wilt the next day.

Urban Explorations

See the Flowers that Bloom All At Once, One Night a Year

The mysterious night-blooming cereus just dazzled a garden in Tucson. Scientists still aren’t sure exactly how they bloom at the same time

New research suggests hawkmoths, like the one pictured above, slow down their brain's ability to process light in order to see at night.

New Research

Hovering Hawkmoths Slow Down Their Brains to See in the Dark

The insects’ night vision appears to be finely tuned to the movement of their flower food sources

Two species of mites make their home in the hair follicles on your face.

Cool Finds

Meet the Mites That Live on Your Face

These microscopic organisms live and die on your face

Male wolf spiders vibrate dead leaves to create purring noises and court females.

Cool Finds

Listen to the Dulcet Purr of a Wolf Spider

Males seduce females by making leaves vibrate

A monarch feasting on milkweed.

Migrating Monarch Butterflies Might Actually Take to the Highway

Threatened pollinators get a trans-continental right of way

The Habronattus sunglow (male pictured above) is a species of jumping spider that has trichromatic or "true" color vision.

New Research

How Jumping Spiders See in Color

The agile arachnids see in three color channels, and they can actually see more colors than humans can

A spider prepares to "balloon" by shooting a threat of silk out of its butt. By catching the wind with their silk, baby spiders can explore or colonize new habitats. When millions of spiders do this at the same time, it resembles rain or snow.

No, It’s Not Really Raining Spiders in Australia

The arachnids are simply catching a ride on the wind

Meet the Prize-Winning Spiders From the British Tarantula Society’s Annual Competition

Now in its 30th year, the arachnid-equivalent of the Westminster Dog Show showcases the strange beauty of an eight-legged obsession

A trap-jaw ant opens its massive mandibles.

New Research

Watch These Ants Hurl Themselves Out of Death Traps With Their Mouths

At least one trap-jaw ant species has coopted its exceptionally strong mandibles to escape its nemesis, the ferocious antlion

A blood-sucker creeping around on a potential victim's pristine white sheets.

Cool Finds

How Our Modern Lives Became Infested With Bed Bugs

After being bitten by the tiny pests, author Brooke Borel set out to learn all she could about her blood-sucking foes

An Aedes aegypti mosquito stops for a quick bite.

New Research

Genes Make Some People More Attractive to Mosquitoes

Certain body odors appear to entice the pesky bloodsuckers—and those smells may be hereditary

Urchin Spheres, (Echinoidea sp.), Thailand, Philippines, United States, Mexico.

Art Meets Science

10 Gorgeous Mosaics Made From Real Animal Specimens

Artist Christopher Marley’s meticulous arrangements capture the incredible variety within families, genera and species

A moth visits a male cone on Ephedra foeminea and feeds on a pollination droplet.

New Research

“Wereplant” Releases Its Pollen By the Light of the Full Moon

An unassuming shrub from the Mediterranean is the first documented case of a plant timing its reproduction to the lunar cycle

A vineyard in Pomerol, Aquitaine, France

Cool Finds

American Bugs Almost Wiped Out France’s Wine Industry

When the Great French Wine Blight hit in the mid 1800s, the culprit turned out to be a pest from the New World that would forever alter wine production

Researchers strapped electronics onto giant flower beetles to better understand how they direct themselves during flight.

New Research

Remote Controlled Bug-Bots Could be First Responders of the Future

Scientists studying how beetles steer themselves in flight gather research that may have implications far beyond understanding bug biology

An African cotton leafworm moth.

New Research

These Moths Remember Where They Mated for the First Time

The locale of the African cotton leafworm moth’s first experience pairing up forms its future preferences, a new study shows

Dragonfly wings have a complex, rigid surface that is maintained by a network of veins. The subtle colors of this immature Black Meadowhawk are caused by sunlight reflecting off the not-quite transparent wings.

Think Big

These Dragonflies Helped an Astronomer Find Ghostly New Galaxies

A Yale scientist set out to capture the insect’s full lifecycle and ended up discovering hidden wonders of the cosmos

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New Research

How Praying Mantises Can Jump Faster Than the Blink of an Eye

Stunning slow-mo videos capture juvenile mantises as they corkscrew through the air and precisely land their target

A black garden ant.

New Research

Ants Have Designated Toilet Areas in Their Nests

A new study shows that black garden ants have a relatively meticulous protocol for when nature calls

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