The Tasmanian marsupial devil suffers from tumors that are even contagious. This has already killed off 85 percent of the population. [The] disappearance of the Tasmanian devil is already changing the ecosystem. With its decline, the population of all those animals that also feed on carcasses and carrion is increasing. For example, the number of […]
Despite being a curious science cat, I must confess I haven’t spent much time looking up human noses. But I have noticed that human nostrils can be a bit…furry. I talked about what’s inside your nose with my friend Edward Johnson. He teaches classes about the human body in the School of Biological Sciences at Washington State […]
Undergraduate awards Twenty-three outstanding seniors, each representing a degree program offered in the College of Arts and Sciences at WSU Pullman, will be honored at a separate medallion ceremony on Friday, May 3, the day before commencement. By College of Arts and Sciences for WSU Insider.
After a successful pilot launch in 2023, the Seattle Experience, a faculty-led alternative spring break program hosted by the College of Arts and Sciences, kicked off the first of a three-year donor-funded series this March. This year’s cohort brought together 12 undergraduate students from several majors across five WSU campuses. The students spent five days in […]
An animal’s position in hierarchical hyena packs influences her gene expression. For a spotted hyena on the Serengeti, social status is everything. Clans adhere to a strict hierarchy of dominance among adult females. Now, a group of researchers has found social status is more than superficial; it stretches into the animals’ DNA (Commun. Biol. 2024, […]
Some soil bacteria can acquire sets of genes that enable them to pump the heavy metal nickel out of their systems, a study has found. This enables the bacteria to not only thrive in otherwise toxic soils but help plants grow there as well. A Washington State University-led research team pinpointed a set of genes […]
Some soil bacteria can acquire sets of genes that enable them to pump the heavy metal nickel out of their systems, a study has found. This enables the bacteria to not only thrive in otherwise toxic soils but help plants grow there as well. A Washington State University-led research team pinpointed a set of genes […]
When Peter Wimberger of the University of Puget Sound was first told about ice worms, he thought that his colleagues were pranking him. Imagine his surprise when he learned that not only are these creatures real, they are full of mysteries that if solved, could help answer one of the biggest questions in science. There […]
While exposure to a single substance like DDT has been shown to create inherited disease susceptibility, a recent study in animals found exposure to multiple different toxicants across generations can amplify those health problems. In the study, published in the journal Environmental Epigenetics, the researchers exposed an initial generation of pregnant rats to a common fungicide, […]
A snippet of hair can reveal a pregnant person’s stress level and may one day help warn of unexpected birth problems, a study indicates. Washington State University researchers measured the stress hormone cortisol in hair samples of 53 women in their third trimester. Of that group, 13 women who had elevated cortisol levels later experienced […]