Category: Biology

By Anupum Pant

The brain of an octopus is the size of a walnut – Significantly smaller than that of us. Or I’d rather say the main brain of an octopus is of that size. That is because only a third of the total neurons in the body of an octopus are in its main brain. Rest of them are distributed in its eight arms.

This is the reason the arms of an octopus are not completely its own. They sort of have a mind of their own. They have the ability to do their own thinking, or at least basic coordination, problem-solving and reaction.

Even when an octopus is killed and its arms are separated from its main body, they still are able to react to stimuli, and more. That is like a severed human arm reacting to a hot kettle. The thing is, even with a walnut sized main brain, it can do so many things that our complex human brains allow us to do.

These creatures are also pretty astounding when it comes to sensing their environment with their arms (skin) and creating camouflage. They are colour blind, and yet they are able to do some amazing texture and colour replication on their skin (as seen in the video below). They can literally see using their skins. Some cephalopods like cuttle fish have the photoreceptor protein in their skin (as well as eyes). We and everything that has an eye have it only their eyes.

By Anupum Pant

When you look at it really closely, it is almost impossible to draw a line between living and dead things. A beautiful animation by Kurzgesagt explains what life is.

By Anupum Pant

Firstly, these are amphibians. Not reptiles, nor are they worms or anything else. The young ones of these strange animals are even more stranger. For 100 million years, the young ones of these creatures have adopted a bizarre practice of eating their own mothers – eat their skin, actually.

The weird practice also has a name and is called der­matophagy, which translates to “skin-eating” in Greek. Or, Maternal dermatophagy, in this case where the mother’s skin is being eaten.

The most interesting part is that this actually works out well for these creatures. In fact the young ones also come with specialized set of teeth to accomplish this. The mother starts developing a nutritious fatty layer on her skin after laying eggs. So, the young ones come out hungry, use their specialized teeth to peel her skin off and eat it to start the development process.

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By Anupum Pant

A few species of bird seem to disappear during the winter and this is something which has made people think in the past. Charles Morton was one of those people who pondered about it and came up with a theory. According to his paper (birds in the moon) published in the year 1703, birds go for a vacation to the moon during winters. Yes, he estimated the moon was 200,000 miles away and said that the birds were able to complete this feat within 60 days. [more]

One thing he wasn’t wrong about was the amount birds travel. Arctic tern for instance is the bird that covers the maximum distance during migration. They literally fly from the Arctic to the Antarctic, and back in a single year. In one year they travel about 50,000 miles. Considering the amount they fly, it proves to be a good form of exercise for them.

Aristotle believed that a kind of bird changed into some other type during winters. Others thought they grew on trees and blossomed only during spring.

But that obviously isn’t true. This is where they actually go and how they do it…

I drink coffee to stay awake. But a study shows that a cup of coffee before going to bed can actually make the quality of your nap better, if you immediately sleep after having it. Wait, isn’t it supposed to be the other way round? How?

It has to do with the nuance that a nap and sleep are not really the same things. Dnews explains…

By Anupum Pant

Be it in the battle field or somewhere else, severe bleeding can cause death in seconds. And until now we had nothing to stop bleeding instantly. At least not in 10 seconds flat. Here’s a gel that stops bleeding and merges into the extracellular matrix within a few seconds. It’s almost the end of 2014 and we’ll have it by the year 2015 starts. This is how science addresses practical problems like a boss…

By Anupum Pant

Irukandji Syndrome is a condition which is so painful that even when the patient suffering from it is given the maximum dose of morphine, will still be in absolute agony. The victim also can’t be made unconscious because to ensure survival doctors have to monitor the victim while they’re conscious. It can also cause cardiac arrest, but is rarely fatal. This is how Wikipedia puts it:

One unusual symptom associated with the syndrome is a feeling of “impending doom”. Patients have been reported as being so certain they are going to die, they beg their doctors to kill them to get it over with.

Mysteriously, until the year 1964, Australians would go into the sea and occasionally come back in extreme agony, not knowing what caused it. The mystery was then solved by Jack Barnes, a medical doctor and a former military commando. How he did it is more interesting than anything else.

In 1961, Jack Handyside Barnes, nine year-old son of Jack Barnes, developed Irukandji syndrome and was rushed into a local hospital. Thus started the detective work of Jack Barnes. Following is an extract of what he did.

He perused through the logs of ambulances and hospitals and found that 85% of such reports were coming from victims at 2 beaches – Palm and Ellis beaches.  By analysing wind directions and sea currents at different times of the year, he concluded that it was a jelly fish that was causing this. However, finding the jelly fish which caused the Irukandji syndrome was another task. He, by putting to use his detective skills finally was able to zero on a small jellyfish that was the size of a thumbnail (more detail on the detective work here).

The jellyfish later came to be known as Carukia barnesi, named after Jack Barnes himself. The story which tells us why it got his name is fascinating.

As a totally conclusive test that this particular jellyfish’s sting caused Irukandji syndrome, he decided to “perform an experiment that would challenge even John Hunter’s auto-inoculation with venereal disease for sheer bravado.”

So, he stung himself with it. Twelve minutes later, remarkable restlessness, constant movement, stamping about aimlessly winging their arms, twisting and writhing ensued. Then came abdominal and back pain, pain in the anterior chest wall and great difficulty in breathing, vomiting and what not. But he was finally able to conclude that it was this tiny thumbnail sized monster which caused it.

By Anupum Pant

While walking across a dirt wall in the rainforest of Tambopata in Peru in 2011, a wildlife photographer Jeff Cremer noticed a few glowing creatures embedded in the wall. He clicked a few pictures and posted them on Reddit to ask the internet if anyone knew what these were.

Entomologists Aaron Pomerantz and his colleagues at the University of Florida went there to see these insects for themselves. They found that the insects were larvae with huge mandibles – which indicated they were predatory. Also, the larvae were bioluminiscent and could control when they wanted to glow.

So, now it can be said that a predatory ‘Glow Worm’ has been discovered in the Peruvian Rainforest.

via [perunature]

By Anupum Pant

Elephants are amazing creatures with an amazing memory. It is often said “an elephant never forgets”. Also elephants display intelligent behaviour all the time. They have an astounding capacity to tackle novel and unforeseen circumstances by rapid and effective change of behaviour. Here’s what happened once in India.

An elephant was ordered to follow a truck and was designated a task of lowering logs into holes that were already dug. It was doing the allotted task nicely, when suddenly it stopped. The animal refused to put in this new log that was supposed to be lowered into a hole. It held the log up in the air and waited. When the elephant mahaout went out to check what was wrong, he found a dog was sleeping inside the hole. Only when the dog was shooed away by the mahaout, the elephant went ahead and lowered the log in there.

But that is just one of those many instances when an elephant showed such flexible behaviour. The video below talks about more such instances. And you can read more here [Link]

By Anupum Pant

The human body is made up of around 10 trillion cells. That’s a number too huge to even imagine in the head. But the number of bacteria in a typical human body is about ten times that number. Yes, you are more bacteria than you are you. The good news is that most of them are good or benign ones. The whole community of other living organisms have a major impact on everything on your life. However, not everything is known about all the things in your body yet.

Similarly, the full mechanism of all the ways in which viruses affect us is still being studies. And an interesting study comes along.

Scientists from Johns Hopkins University and the University of Nebraska have discovered a kind of virus, which they call the “stupidity virus”, is something that they believe affects human intelligence. They don’t seem to make you unhealthy in any way. There’s a lot to be sceptical about it for now. But, considering the sheer amount of information we don’t have, let’s keep an open mind about it.

They found these viruses in throat cultures of a few healthy subjects. 44% of the healthy subjects who tested positive for this virus recorded an average of 7-9 IQ points less. I know, IQ tests can’t be trusted, but that’s fine.

At least, now you have someone to blame when you score low on your tests.

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By Anupum Pant

I was in the bus today. Considering the hot desert sun outside, it was fairly dark inside. The moment I stepped out,  sneezed. For once again it felt like there was something about the sun that made me sneeze. Instantly I was reminded of the countless times this has happened to me in the past. I asked a couple of friends and I found that most shared a similar experience. I had to find out more about it.

Turns out, about third of the people in our planet have their brains wired in a way that makes them sneeze when they see the sun – or more specifically, when a sudden change in light intensity occurs. It’s called photic sneeze reflex, photoptarmosis or simply “sun sneezing”. It’s one of those phenomena which are not totally understood till now, but there’s a good explanation for it.

It’s been noted for a long time. Even Aristotle had documented it in The Book of Problems. According to him it was the nose getting heated by the sun which caused it. However, his explanation for it wasn’t very accurate.

An English philosopher Francis Bacon proved his theory wrong by closing his eyes and letting his nose heat in the sun. He didn’t sneeze. His theory was that the sun made eyes water and the moisture in in turn irritated the nose, which causes you to sneeze. Not really.

This is how scientists explain it – As we all know, an irritation in the nose causes sneezing. That is because a nerve called trigeminal nerve senses irritation and sends a signal to the brain. This nerve is very close to the optic nerve. So, when the eye is exposed to sunlight, the optic nerve sends an electric signal to the brain. This signal, scientists think, leaks into the trigeminal nerve too and makes it fire a signal (saying “irritation”). And then you sneeze.

As it is understood presently, this is a genetic trait that is passed on to the offspring with a 50% chance of the offspring showing the same trait. So, if one parent sneezes in the sun, one out of two of his kids will have the same reflex.

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By Anupum Pant

On the seabed, a mysterious geometrically symmetric circular pattern measuring about 6.5 feet in diameter was spotted. The pattern resembled crop circles. The artist wasn’t known for some time and there were many stories sprouting on the internet.

It was found later using underwater cameras that the artist was a puffer fish. Male puffer fish make this beautiful sculpture to attract a female puffer fish. It has since been observed that more ridges and more shells a male puffer fish adorns its sculpture with, more are the chances it would attract a mate.

By Anupum Pant

Of course there are owls like the burrowing owl and the short-eared owl  who are active during the day, but most owls hunt in the darkness. The ones who hunt at night rely on stealth to surprise and catch their prey. For this, owls have evolved in a really beautiful manner.

Firstly, owls have very dull coloured feathers which allow it to blend with the surroundings. At night, or even during the day, such colours make them virtually invisible among tree barks and leaves. Do you see an owl in this picture? Trust me, there is one. Try looking closely.

But there’s another more interesting way by which owls are able to execute the silent kill. Over the years, they have evolved to produce feathers which have tiny serrations on one edge of some of their feathers. These reduce the wing flap sound significantly.

More interestingly, owls who hunt fish, who don’t need to be silent, don’t have these serrations. That’s because it serves no evolutionary advantage for them.

By Anupum Pant

I talked about chillies the other day. It’s really interesting how plants evolved to spread their seeds and migrate to places.

When seeds drop off near a plant, it’s bad for the mother plant because the young one starts to compete with it, for food and nutrients – not a very good thing to keep your genetic line alive. So to avoid this from happening plants adapted by putting their seeds in these sweet things called fruits. As if inviting animals and humans to pick it, eat it and throw the seed at some place far away. In case the seeds get eaten, they usually don’t get digested and still fall out with the droppings to some new place. Also to prevent seeds from going away before they were mature, as they were pumped with a chemical called tanin, unripe fruits evolved to be dry and sharp tasting.

But cranberry plants thought of trying something different. Instead of wasting precious sugar by putting them in fruits, they put in tanin into the cranberries – which is what gives that not-sweet taste to cranberries. That also meant the fuits would taste bad and animals won’t eat them (but we still do, all those years of evolution for nothing?). To get transported to places far away, cranberries got a design that featured an air pocket inside so they’d float. When the fruit becomes ripe, it drops onto the water, floats and goes to a distant place to spread the genetic line.

To make it worse for the evolutionary plan, cranberries floating in water makes it even easier for humans to harvest them.