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Animals and nature.
Two hearts pump blood through the gills, one pumps it through the rest of the body — and the blood itself is blue, not red.
Learn more →Sharks evolved around 450 million years ago — a solid few tens of millions of years before the first trees existed.
Learn more →Adult giraffes can function on as little as 30 minutes to 2 hours of sleep a day, usually broken into short, minutes-long naps.
Learn more →Despite having a brain the size of a poppy seed, bees in experiments learn to tell one specific human face apart from others.
Learn more →A reflective layer inside a reindeer's eye physically changes structure with the seasons, shifting the iris's color.
Learn more →Koala fingerprints are similar enough to human ones that under a microscope, they've even confused forensic experts.
Learn more →Some ant species link their legs and jaws together into living bridges and rafts so the rest of the colony can cross.
Learn more →These millimeter-sized animals can enter a state of suspended metabolism and survive conditions that would kill almost any other organism.
Learn more →A mantis shrimp's limbs accelerate so violently they trigger cavitation — bubbles that collapse and release heat and light.
Learn more →As the only known animal to do it, the wombat shapes its droppings into near-perfect cubes thanks to varying elasticity in its intestinal wall.
Learn more →Turritopsis dohrnii, nicknamed the "immortal jellyfish," can turn its mature cells back into a juvenile form.
Learn more →The Mexican amphibian larva known as the axolotl regenerates lost body parts almost without scarring, rebuilding bone, muscle, nerves, and blood vessels.
Learn more →Elysia chlorotica absorbs chloroplasts from the algae it eats and builds them into its own cells, producing energy from light like a plant.
Learn more →The world's largest land arthropod can crush a coconut's hard shell with its claws, generating one of the strongest grips ever measured in the animal kingdom.
Learn more →A special arrangement of blood vessels and neck vertebrae lets owls rotate their heads nearly three times further than a human can, without cutting off blood flow to the brain.
Learn more →Mudskippers are fish that come ashore on muddy coastlines, move around on their fins like legs, and breathe through their moist skin.
Learn more →Every bottlenose dolphin develops its own unique signature whistle that functions like a name, and other dolphins recognize and repeat it.
Learn more →The structure of a kangaroo's legs, its powerful tail, and the way it moves rule out backward motion entirely — which is why it even ended up on Australia's coat of arms as a symbol of progress.
Learn more →Salmon memorize the unique chemical "scent" of their home river and, after years spent in the open ocean, can find their way back to it to spawn.
Learn more →The snap of a pistol shrimp's claw generates a sound louder than a gunshot, strong enough to stun a small fish.
Learn more →Tendons in a bat's feet clamp shut mechanically under the weight of its own body, so hanging costs it essentially no energy at all.
Learn more →Vultures eat carrion in a state of decay that would kill almost any other animal, thanks to a stomach with exceptionally strong acidity.
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