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Life Sciences

A forest smothered in vines.
Photo Credit
Jonathan Hammond via iStock
Kudzu got a foothold in North America in 1876 and has since gotten a stranglehold on the forests of the Southeast.

Vast botanical data help solve Darwin’s puzzle of why some exotic plants become pests

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Sunbeams filter down on a algae-covered rocks on a shallow seafloor.
Photo Credit
Johan Holmdahl via iStock
Oxygenated seafloors were likely the cradle of eukaryotic life.

Early complex life clung to oxygenated seafloors for hundreds of millions of years
closeup of a black bird called a grackle

Grackle research reveals behavioral flexibility and adaptation in action
a close up image of a fruit fly

Newly discovered neural connections reveal that inhibitory neurons can also drive movement
A box of mounted and labeled iridescent bees.
Photo Credit
Gayle Laird ©2021 California Academy of Sciences
Museum collections hold a wealth of data just waiting to be brought into the digital age.

The Big Bee Project brings natural history collections into the 21st century
two researchers in blue, one holding a crab
Photo Credit
Matt Perko
Sophia Lecuona Manos, right, is one of several student researchers who discovered a new crab egg predator in the lab of UCSB parasitologist Armand Kuris, left, holding a yellow rock crab.

UCSB students discover new crab egg predator
three scientists in lab coats in a laboratory
Photo Credit
Matt Perko
Researchers Mia Raimondi, left, Christopher Hayes and lead author Michael Costello have uncovered how pathogenic Bordetella bacteria adhere to mammalian airways despite their hosts' natural defenses

A new look at an old protein may yield therapy for contagious respiratory disease
Five adults in business attire standing shoulder to shoulder in a natural setting
Photo Credit
Courtesy UCSB Engineering
Left to right: Samuel Lobo, Devon Callan, Erica Keane Rivera, Ventura Rivera, Austin Dubose

UCSB startup builds software to speed drug discovery
A mosquito lands on a blue fabric.
Photo Credit
Photo by Егор Камелев on Unsplash
Finding the right taste to send mosquitoes packing could save hundreds of thousands of lives.

Mosquito taste receptor could lead to new insect repellents
Oil droplets suspended in water.
Photo Credit
Carther via iStock
Small, naturally occurring droplets could have accelerated the development of early life.

Electrifying biology in a bubble
illustration of swimming microbes on dark background
Microbes are responsible for much of carbon sequestration in the ocean

The mystery of the missing deep ocean carbon fixers
illustration of the brain and the corpus callosum
Photo Credit
Life Science Databases, Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 2.1 Japan
The corpus callosum, in red, connects the two hemispheres of the brain together.

New findings in split-brain science: Even minimal fiber connections can unify consciousness
1880-1893 medical watercolor image of polycystic kidney
Photo Credit
Teniswood, George Francis, "Polycystic kidney," Barts Health NHS Trust Archives, c1880-1893 CC BY 4.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0>, via Wikimedia Commons
Watercolor drawing showing two views of a polycystic kidney. One shows the external surface of the kidney, the other when the organ is bisected. Drawing given to the Museum by Dr. Draper Mackinder, MD, Gainsborough, Lincolnshire

A ‘magic bullet’ for polycystic kidney disease in the making
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