EurekAlert! News by Subject: Biology - News by Subject: Biology

Biology

Updates every hour. Last Updated: 5-May-2025 17:09 ET (5-May-2025 21:09 GMT/UTC)

Giant virus encodes key piece of protein-making machinery of cellular life

University of Hawaii at Manoa
Peer-Reviewed Publication

Researchers at the University of Hawai‘i at Mānoa recently discovered that a virus, FloV-SA2, encodes one of the proteins needed to make ribosomes, the central engines in all cells that translate genetic information into proteins, the building blocks of life. This is the first eukaryotic virus (a virus that infects eukaryotes, such as plants, animals, fungi) found to encode such a protein.

Journal: npj Viruses
Funder: U.S. National Science Foundation, Simons Foundation

World’s only bonobo sanctuary helps orphaned apes overcome trauma to develop social skills and empathy

Durham University
Peer-Reviewed Publication

Apes orphaned by the illegal trade in bushmeat and pets can overcome trauma and develop social abilities like those of their mother-reared peers.

Journal: Royal Society Open Science
Funder: Templeton World Charity Foundation, H2020 European Research Council

Using drones, UH researchers assess the health of humpback whale mother-calf pairs across the Pacific Ocean

University of Hawaii at Manoa
Peer-Reviewed Publication

University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa Hawaiʻi Institute of Marine Biology biologists used drone imagery to understand how nursing humpback whale mothers and their calves fare as they cross the Pacific Ocean. Recent declines in North Pacific humpback whale reproduction and survival of calves highlight the need to understand how mother-calf pairs expend energy across their migratory cycle.

Journal: The Journal of Physiology

More calories – more consumption: Individuals with and without obesity both prefer high-calories food

PLOS
Peer-Reviewed Publication

Higher calorie foods were preferred among individuals with and without obesity despite similar taste and texture, according to a study published December 17^th in the open-access journal PLOS Biology by Albino Oliveira-Maia from the Champalimaud Foundation, Portugal, and colleagues.

Journal: PLOS Biology

Ocean microbe’s unusual pair of enzymes may boost carbon storage, study suggests

Stanford University
Peer-Reviewed Publication

Stanford scientists have discovered multiple forms of a ubiquitous enzyme in microbes that thrive in low-oxygen zones off the coasts of Central and South America. The results may open new possibilities for growing crops with fewer resources and understanding ocean carbon storage.

Journal: Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences
Funder: U.S. National Science Foundation, Simons Foundation

This mysterious plant fossil belongs to a family that no longer exists

Florida Museum of Natural History
Peer-Reviewed Publication

A fossil plant preserved roughly 47 million years ago has a such a strange assortment of features that scientists were unable to find a plant family, living or extinct, to which it might belong.

Journal: Annals of Botany

Top cancer research advances at MSK in 2024

Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center
Peer-Reviewed Publication

Researchers at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center (MSK) continued to make strides against cancer in 2024. Laboratory research teams across the institution worked to advance the global understanding of cancer and to develop new therapies, while also making fundamental insights into human biology and disease.