Biology

Sex might help natural selection purge excessive mistakes from our genes.

New techniques expose unexpected diversity within seemingly uniform tissues.

Asexual reproduction can produce twice as many offspring as sexual reproduction without the hassle of finding and courting a mate. So why do most complex animals have two sexes? Why not three?

The evolutionary biologist Jessica Flack seeks the computational rules that groups of organisms use to solve problems.

If gut bacteria can sway their hosts to be selfless, it could answer a riddle that goes back to Darwin.

An unexpected mechanism allows wasps to rapidly co-opt genes for new toxic functions.

The legendary marine biologist discusses why she’s excited about the coming era of ocean science, the shortsightedness of maritime exploitation and diving in the Arctic in her 80s.

The computational immunologist Purvesh Khatri embraces messy data as a way to capture the messiness of disease. As a result, he’s making elusive genomic discoveries.

How Darwinian natural selection can produce and sustain a Lamarckian “inheritance of acquired characteristics.”