Dogs don’t read the words on a page. Neither did Coco, the famous gorilla that learned to communicate using simple hand signs. So what affords humans the unique ability to read and write, and why do we do it? These kinds of questions drive Zeynep Saygin’s research at Ohio State. Her team’s recent discovery sets the stage for some answers.

Sever an arm from an octopus, and like an underwater zombie it’ll keep groping its surroundings. Even without a brain, its suckers still detect and grab crabs in lab experiments. Now Harvard researchers have begun discovering what makes octopus suckers so smart.

The platypus is perhaps the most evolution-defying creature on Earth.

The standard theme often given for Viking history is that of blond-haired, blued-eyed, burly men exploring, trading, ransacking, and pillaging across Europe, Asia, and the North Atlantic.

Recently, researchers have reported on the world’s “highest-dwelling mammal,” the yellow-rumped leaf-eared mouse, observed upon a dormant volcano 6,739 meters (22,110 feet) above sea level.¹ While the discovery of birds at greater altitudes is not surprising, “that mammals can live at these heights is astonishing, considering there’s only about 44 percent of the oxygen available at s