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Changes to polar bear DNA could help them adapt to global heating, study finds

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Friday, December 12, 2025

Changes in polar bear DNA that could help the animals adapt to warmer climates have been detected by researchers, in a study thought to be the first time a statistically significant link has been found between rising temperatures and changing DNA in a wild mammal species.Climate breakdown is threatening the survival of polar bears. Two-thirds of them are expected to have disappeared by 2050 as their icy habitat melts and the weather becomes hotter.Now scientists at the University of East Anglia have found that some genes related to heat stress, ageing and metabolism are behaving differently in polar bears living in south-east Greenland, suggesting they may be adjusting to warmer conditions.The researchers analysed blood samples taken from polar bears in two regions of Greenland and compared “jumping genes”: small, mobile pieces of the genome that can influence how other genes work. Scientists looked at the genes in relation to temperatures in the two regions and at the associated changes in gene expression.“DNA is the instruction book inside every cell, guiding how an organism grows and develops,” said the lead researcher, Dr Alice Godden. “By comparing these bears’ active genes to local climate data, we found that rising temperatures appear to be driving a dramatic increase in the activity of jumping genes within the south-east Greenland bears’ DNA.”As local climates and diets evolve as a result of changes in habitat and prey forced by global heating, the genetics of the bears appear to be adapting, with the group of bears in the warmest part of the country showing more changes than the communities farther north. The authors of the study have said these changes could help us understand how polar bears might survive in a warming world, inform understanding of which populations are most at risk and guide future conservation efforts.This is because the findings, published on Friday in the journal Mobile DNA, suggest the genes that are changing play a crucial role in how different polar bear populations are evolving.Godden said: “This finding is important because it shows, for the first time, that a unique group of polar bears in the warmest part of Greenland are using ‘jumping genes’ to rapidly rewrite their own DNA, which might be a desperate survival mechanism against melting sea ice.”Temperatures in north-east Greenland are colder and less variable, while in the south-east there is a much warmer and less icy environment, with steep temperature fluctuations.DNA sequences in animals change over time, but this process can be accelerated by environmental stress such as a rapidly heating climate.There were some interesting DNA changes, such as in areas linked to fat processing, that could help polar bears survive when food is scarce. Bears in warmer regions had more rough, plant-based diets compared with the fatty, seal-based diets of northern bears, and the DNA of south-eastern bears seemed to be adapting to this.Godden said: “We identified several genetic hotspots where these jumping genes were highly active, with some located in the protein-coding regions of the genome, suggesting that the bears are undergoing rapid, fundamental genetic changes as they adapt to their disappearing sea ice habitat.”The next step will be to look at other polar bear populations, of which there are 20 around the world, to see if similar changes are happening to their DNA.This research could help protect the bears from extinction. But the scientists said it was crucial to stop temperature rises accelerating by reducing the burning of fossil fuels.Godden said: “We cannot be complacent, this offers some hope but does not mean that polar bears are at any less risk of extinction. We still need to be doing everything we can to reduce global carbon emissions and slow temperature increases.”

Scientists say bears in southern Greenland differ genetically to those in the north, suggesting they could adjustChanges in polar bear DNA that could help the animals adapt to warmer climates have been detected by researchers, in a study thought to be the first time a statistically significant link has been found between rising temperatures and changing DNA in a wild mammal species.Climate breakdown is threatening the survival of polar bears. Two-thirds of them are expected to have disappeared by 2050 as their icy habitat melts and the weather becomes hotter. Continue reading...

Changes in polar bear DNA that could help the animals adapt to warmer climates have been detected by researchers, in a study thought to be the first time a statistically significant link has been found between rising temperatures and changing DNA in a wild mammal species.

Climate breakdown is threatening the survival of polar bears. Two-thirds of them are expected to have disappeared by 2050 as their icy habitat melts and the weather becomes hotter.

Now scientists at the University of East Anglia have found that some genes related to heat stress, ageing and metabolism are behaving differently in polar bears living in south-east Greenland, suggesting they may be adjusting to warmer conditions.

The researchers analysed blood samples taken from polar bears in two regions of Greenland and compared “jumping genes”: small, mobile pieces of the genome that can influence how other genes work. Scientists looked at the genes in relation to temperatures in the two regions and at the associated changes in gene expression.

“DNA is the instruction book inside every cell, guiding how an organism grows and develops,” said the lead researcher, Dr Alice Godden. “By comparing these bears’ active genes to local climate data, we found that rising temperatures appear to be driving a dramatic increase in the activity of jumping genes within the south-east Greenland bears’ DNA.”

As local climates and diets evolve as a result of changes in habitat and prey forced by global heating, the genetics of the bears appear to be adapting, with the group of bears in the warmest part of the country showing more changes than the communities farther north. The authors of the study have said these changes could help us understand how polar bears might survive in a warming world, inform understanding of which populations are most at risk and guide future conservation efforts.

This is because the findings, published on Friday in the journal Mobile DNA, suggest the genes that are changing play a crucial role in how different polar bear populations are evolving.

Godden said: “This finding is important because it shows, for the first time, that a unique group of polar bears in the warmest part of Greenland are using ‘jumping genes’ to rapidly rewrite their own DNA, which might be a desperate survival mechanism against melting sea ice.”

Temperatures in north-east Greenland are colder and less variable, while in the south-east there is a much warmer and less icy environment, with steep temperature fluctuations.

DNA sequences in animals change over time, but this process can be accelerated by environmental stress such as a rapidly heating climate.

There were some interesting DNA changes, such as in areas linked to fat processing, that could help polar bears survive when food is scarce. Bears in warmer regions had more rough, plant-based diets compared with the fatty, seal-based diets of northern bears, and the DNA of south-eastern bears seemed to be adapting to this.

Godden said: “We identified several genetic hotspots where these jumping genes were highly active, with some located in the protein-coding regions of the genome, suggesting that the bears are undergoing rapid, fundamental genetic changes as they adapt to their disappearing sea ice habitat.”

The next step will be to look at other polar bear populations, of which there are 20 around the world, to see if similar changes are happening to their DNA.

This research could help protect the bears from extinction. But the scientists said it was crucial to stop temperature rises accelerating by reducing the burning of fossil fuels.

Godden said: “We cannot be complacent, this offers some hope but does not mean that polar bears are at any less risk of extinction. We still need to be doing everything we can to reduce global carbon emissions and slow temperature increases.”

Read the full story here.
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A Deadly Pathogen Decimated Sunflower Sea Stars. Look Inside the Lab Working to Bring Them Back by Freezing and Thawing Their Larvae

For the first time, scientists have cryopreserved and revived the larvae of a sea star species. The breakthrough, made with the giant pink star, gives hope the technique could be repeated to save the imperiled predator

A Deadly Pathogen Decimated Sunflower Sea Stars. Look Inside the Lab Working to Bring Them Back by Freezing and Thawing Their Larvae For the first time, scientists have cryopreserved and revived the larvae of a sea star species. The breakthrough, made with the giant pink star, gives hope the technique could be repeated to save the imperiled predator Juvenile sunflower sea stars at the Sunflower Star Laboratory in Moss Landing, California. At this phase, each is less than an inch wide, but they can grow to be more than three feet across as adults. Avery Schuyler Nunn Key takeaways: Recovering sunflower sea stars by freezing them in time Ravaged by infectious bacteria, sunflower sea stars literally wasted away across the Pacific coast of North America—and their resulting population crash destabilized kelp forest ecosystems. Scientists pioneered a cryopreservation technique on the closely related giant pink star, raising hopes that a bank of frozen sunflower star larvae could one day be thawed in the same way and released into the wild. Along a working California harbor, where gulls wheel over weathered pilings and the old Western Flyer—the ship John Steinbeck once sailed to the Sea of Cortez—sits restored in its berth, researchers buzz about in a modest lab tucked between warehouses and boatyards. Inside, amid the hiss of pumps and the faint smell of brine from seawater tables, a scientist lifts a small vial from a plume of liquid nitrogen, its frosted casing holding the tiniest flicker of hope for a species on the brink. Each of the 18 vials contains between 500 and 700 larval giant pink sea stars. At this stage, they are tiny specks suspended in seawater, invisible to the naked eye. These particular larvae have been cryopreserved and stored at roughly minus 180 degrees Celsius since March. At the Sunflower Star Laboratory (SSL) in Moss Landing, California, scientists thawed the larval pink sea stars and coaxed them to successfully develop into juveniles this summer—a first for any sea star species. In October, the scientists thawed another batch of larvae from the same cohort to test larval growth and survival under different freezing conditions and thawing protocols. The breakthrough, however, isn’t really about the giant pink star, a species that’s common in the wild. Instead, these larvae serve as a crucial stand-in for the far more imperiled sunflower sea star (Pycnopodia helianthoides)—a vanishing species for which larvae are precious, limited and increasingly difficult to obtain. Perfecting cryopreservation methods on pink stars—ensuring they can survive freezing, resume feeding and grow into juveniles—lays the scientific groundwork for facilitating a return of Pycnopodia. The contents of a thawed vial are placed under a microscope to assess viability of the larvae. Avery Schuyler Nunn The discovery arrives at a precarious time, as sunflower stars have disappeared at a pace rarely seen in marine ecosystems. As a mysterious pathogen ravaged their population along the western shores of North America beginning in 2013, the creatures collapsed from an estimated six billion individuals to functional extinction in parts of their range—all within just a few years. Their loss left kelp forests with dramatically fewer predators, destabilizing ecosystems across the Pacific coast and allowing urchins to proliferate and graze formerly lush underwater canopies into barren rock. Now, scientists hope that “freezing” their larvae will offer a new avenue for bringing the species back. “Cryopreservation is particularly important on the population level when thinking about recovery for this endangered species, because it had major population losses,” says Marissa Baskett, an environmental scientist at the University of California, Davis, who was not involved in the project. The process lets scientists preserve the sea stars’ existing genetic diversity for future reintroduction to the wild, she adds. “Especially given the uncertainty about different disease outbreaks, having that stock to return to is incredibly valuable.” A mysterious and “complete collapse” Sunflower sea stars have long lived in abundance up and down the rugged Pacific coast—from Alaskan archipelagoes to Baja California. The 24-limbed echinoderms sprawled across the seafloor in shades of ochre, crimson and violet. Among the fastest-moving and largest of all sea stars—capable of stretching nearly three feet across—these radiant predators coursed through kelp forests, voraciously hunting purple sea urchins and preventing them from over-grazing on the holdfasts that root towering golden canopies of kelp. An adult sunflower sea star has 24 limbs and can be more than three feet wide. This one was photographed off Point Dume State Beach near Los Angeles. Brent Durand via Getty Images “In Northern California and Oregon, there historically would have been multiple keystone predators within the kelp forest ecosystem who are punching on purple urchins and keeping their population in check,” says Reuven Bank, board chair of SSL. “But the southern sea otter was extirpated across its historic range, so we were left with sunflower stars being the last major keystone predator of purple urchins across over 100 miles of coastline.” “And sunflower stars didn’t just eat urchins, they scared them,” Bank adds. “Urchins can smell a sunflower star approaching, and in healthy kelp forests they hide more and graze less. Even without consuming them, sunflower stars helped keep urchin behavior, and therefore kelp forests, in balance.” Then, in June 2013, tidepool monitors along Washington’s Olympic Peninsula documented an unprecedented sight. The once-sturdy sea stars had turned soft, pale and contorted, their arms curling and detaching from their bodies. By late summer, the same mysterious affliction had surfaced in British Columbia, and it began sweeping both north and south with startling speed. The emerging epidemic, which caused the invertebrates to literally disintegrate, would soon be known as sea star wasting disease. An infamous marine heatwave—nicknamed “The Blob”—had settled over the Pacific by 2014, thrusting the coast into a fever. Ocean temperatures spiked, likely speeding up the disease progression in already stressed sea stars and leading to higher mortality. In the warm, stagnant water, infected sunflower stars dissolved at an eerily rapid pace, leaving behind ghost-white films of bacterial mass where the vibrant predators had been just days before. “You’d have apparently healthy stars basically melt away into puddles of goo within 48 hours,” says Andrew Kim, lab manager at SSL. “It happened so quickly, and I don’t think folks were prepared for the ensuing ecosystem shift. You don’t often expect diseases to come through and totally reshape ecosystem dynamics within such a short period. But that’s what we saw.” Without sunflower sea stars to keep those spiny purple urchins in check, the balance began to falter, setting the stage for an unprecedented chain reaction. Urchin populations skyrocketed, grazing on kelp without limits, and once-thriving underwater forests collapsed into barren rock. A dense group of purple sea urchins, which exploded in population after the sunflower sea stars disappeared, photographed near Mendocino Headlands State Park, north of San Francisco. Brent Durand via Getty Images In California, with 99 percent loss, sunflower sea stars are now considered functionally extinct. “Even though there may be a few remnant individuals left, they can no longer fulfill their historic role in the ecosystem,” Bank says. As sunflower stars unraveled in the wild, another species—its thick-armed cousin, the giant pink star—offered an unexpected foothold for hope. The pink stars share a nearly identical geographic range and life history with sunflower stars, and crucially, their larvae can be raised in aquaria. If scientists could learn to freeze and revive the pink star in its early life stages, they wondered, could that knowledge become a lifeline for the sunflower star? That’s where the small team in Moss Landing stepped in. Freezing sea stars for the future What these scientists did was something no one had ever pulled off with a sea star. Working with giant pink stars, researchers spawned adults at the Aquarium of the Pacific in Long Beach, California, fertilized their gametes to produce thousands of larvae, and shipped those microscopic bodies to the Frozen Zoo—a cryopreserved archive of creatures operated by the San Diego Zoo Wildlife Alliance. There, reproductive scientists plunged the larvae into liquid nitrogen, cooling them to extremely low temperatures and pausing their cells’ biological activity. The larvae, essentially frozen in time, were shielded from ice crystal damage with special cryoprotectant mixtures. Sunflower Star Laboratory researchers remove a vial of pink star larvae from an insulated cooler at around minus 180 degrees Celsius in preparation for thawing. Avery Schuyler Nunn After months in this suspended state, the larvae were sent to the Sunflower Star Laboratory where Carly Young, a San Diego Zoo Wildlife Alliance scientist who advances cryopreservation and reproductive-rescue tools, led the team in thawing the vials. She had fine-tuned the ideal way to keep the larvae alive as they returned to real-world temperatures, carefully testing more than 100 “recipes” with various warming rates, cryoprotectant dilutions and rehydration steps. The pink star larvae not only survived thawing, but have thus far lived all the way through metamorphosis into juveniles. Scientists watched the little stars settle spontaneously along the bottom of their beakers just 19 days after revival. The success prompted the team to apply the same cryopreservation protocols to sunflower star larvae from the Alaska SeaLife Center. The larvae will be frozen in perpetuity, creating the first-ever cryopreserved archive of the species—like a seed bank, but for the baby sea stars. “A famous quote from the ’70s, when the Frozen Zoo in San Diego was established, was, ‘You must collect things for reasons you don’t yet understand,’” says Ashley Kidd, conservation project manager at SSL. “We don’t know when the other shoe is going to drop and what populations are going to look like as the planet changes. So, rather than chasing ghosts around the ocean floor, we really focused on what we can do with animals that are currently under human care somewhere.” While cryopreservation itself isn’t a ready-made restoration tool, it opens the door to conserving genetic diversity of a species and banking rare lineages for potential reintroduction to the wild. In the 1970s and 1990s, researchers began testing cryopreservation of marine invertebrates with sperm and larvae, establishing the basic protocols that this team could apply to sea stars. The breakthrough doesn’t restore kelp forests by itself, but the SSL scientists note that cryopreservation creates something the conservation community has desperately needed: time. Time to hold onto genetic diversity, time to refine captive rearing and time to prepare for future reintroduction at scales big enough to matter. The ultimate test, the researchers say, will be translating the thawing process to sunflower sea stars. Carly Young, at the Sunflower Star Laboratory, looks for movement in the young sea stars. Avery Schuyler Nunn Just this summer, scientists uncovered a piece of the puzzle that had eluded them for more than a decade: the pathogen behind sea star wasting disease. In a four-year international effort, researchers traced the outbreak to a strain of the marine bacterium Vibrio pectenicida. When cultured and injected into healthy sea stars, it reproduced the telltale symptoms—softening arms, rapid disintegration and death within days. The finding, published in Nature Ecology and Evolution in August, gives recovery teams a way to test for the pathogen in labs and hatcheries, tighten quarantine measures and understand disease risks before returning captive-bred sea stars to the Pacific. “It’s massively important to know what to look for, and the fact that we are now able to test for this disease is going to be critical in advancing our ability to move forward with reintroductions and continuing the research,” notes Kim. “We’ve already been able to take fluid samples from all of our stars and get them analyzed for the presence of Vibrio pectenicida, so we’ve mobilized very quickly on the heels of development.” Paired with this new diagnostic clarity, advances in cryopreservation offer a second front in the effort to save the species. Frozen larvae can be stored for decades and offer flexibility for selective breeding of disease-tolerant traits, notes the team. Cryopreservation adds another tool to the scientists’ toolbox as they fight to prevent the species—and, in turn, its ecosystem—from wasting away. “Bringing back sunflower stars,” Bank says, “is the single-most important step we can take toward restoring kelp forest balance.” Get the latest Science stories in your inbox.

Animals
Conservation
Culture

Archaeologists Are Unraveling the Mysteries Behind Deep Pits Found Near Stonehenge

Based on a comprehensive study, researchers are now convinced the shafts were human-made, likely dug during the Late Neolithic period roughly 4,000 years ago

Archaeologists Are Unraveling the Mysteries Behind Deep Pits Found Near Stonehenge Based on a comprehensive study, researchers are now convinced the shafts were human-made, likely dug during the Late Neolithic period roughly 4,000 years ago Sarah Kuta - Daily Correspondent December 10, 2025 9:59 a.m. The pits are evenly spaced around a large circle. University of Bradford In 2020, archaeologists in the United Kingdom made a surprising discovery. At Durrington Walls, a large Neolithic henge not far from Stonehenge, they found more than a dozen large, deep pits buried under layers of loose clay. The pits are mysterious. Each one measures roughly 30 feet wide by 15 feet deep, and together they form a mile-wide circle around Durrington Walls and neighboring Woodhenge. They also appear to be linked with the much older Larkhill causewayed enclosure, built more than 1,000 years before Durrington Walls. For the last few years, archaeologists have been puzzling over their origins: Were they dug intentionally by human hands? Were they naturally occurring structures, like sinkholes? Or is there some other possible explanation for the existence of these colossal shafts? Quick fact: The purpose of Durrington Walls While Stonehenge is thought to have been a sacred place for ceremonies, Durrington Walls was a place where people actually lived. In a new paper published in the journal Internet Archaeology, archaeologists report that they have a much better understanding of the pits’ purpose, chronology and environmental setting. And, now, they are confident the shafts were made by humans. “They can’t be occurring naturally,” says lead author Vincent Gaffney, an archaeologist at the University of Bradford, to the Guardian’s Steven Morris. “It just can’t happen. We think we’ve nailed it.” Chris Gaffney, an archaeologist at the at the University of Bradford, surveys the ground near Durrington Walls. University of Bradford For the study, researchers returned to the site in southern England and used several different methods to further analyze the unusual structures. They used a technique known as electrical resistance tomography to calculate the pits’ depths, and radar and magnetometry to suss out their shapes. They also took core samples of the sediment, then ran the soil through a variety of tests. For instance, they used optically stimulated luminescence to determine the last time each layer of soil had been exposed to the sun. They also looked for traces of animal or plant DNA. Astonishing' Stonehenge discovery offers new insights into Neolithic ancestors. Together, the results of these analyses indicate humans must have been involved, which suggests the pits could be “one of the largest prehistoric structures in Britain, if not the largest,” Gaffney tells the BBC’s Sophie Parker. Researchers suspect the circle pits were created by people living at the site over a short period of time during the Late Neolithic period roughly 4,000 years ago. They were not “simply dug and abandoned” but, rather, appear to have been part of a “structured, monumental landscape that speaks to the complexity and sophistication of Neolithic society,” Gaffney says in a statement. For example, the pits are fairly evenly spaced around the circle, which suggests their Neolithic creators were measuring the distances between them somehow. “The skill and effort that must have been required to not only dig the pits, but also to place them so precisely within the landscape is a marvel,” says study co-author Richard Bates, a geophysicist at the University of St Andrews, in a statement. “When you consider that the pits are spread over such a large distance, the fact they are located in a near perfect circular pattern is quite remarkable.” Researchers used multiple methods to investigate the pits at Durrington Walls. University of Bradford But who dug the pits? And, perhaps more importantly, why? Archaeologists are still trying to definitively answer those questions, but they suspect the shafts were created to serve as some sort of sacred boundary around Durrington Walls. Their creators may also have been trying to connect with the underworld, per the Guardian. “They’re inscribing something about their cosmology, their belief systems, into the earth itself in a very dramatic way,” Gaddney tells the BBC. Get the latest stories in your inbox every weekday.

Animals
Science

Is red meat bad for you? Limited research robs us of a clear answer.

We’d all appreciate more definitive guidance. Eating a varied diet is a wise move while we wait.

Over and over, we ask the question: Is Food X good or bad for you? And, over and over, belief in the answer — whether it’s yes or no — is held with conviction totally out of proportion with the strength of the evidence.Today’s illustration: red meat. It has become one of the most-disputed issues in food. It’s so polarizing that some people decide to eat no meat at all, while others decide to eat only meat. It’s poison, or it’s the only true fuel.The latest salvo in the Meat Wars was kicked off by a new report that outlines the optimal diet for both people and planet. The EAT-Lancet Report comes down hard on red meat; its recommended daily intake is a mere 14 grams — that’s half an ounce.Read on, and the news gets worse: “Because intake of red meat is not essential and appears to be linearly related to higher total mortality and risks of other health outcomes in populations that have consumed it for many years, the optimal intake may be zero.”Note that word: “related.” It’s the source of the problem with the report and its recommendation.The EAT-Lancet report, by researchers from 17 countries, bases its recommendation solely on observational data. When you do that, meat comes out looking pretty bad. In study after study, people who report eating a lot of meat have worse health outcomes than people who eat little. Meat-eating correlates with increased risk of heart disease, some cancers and all-cause mortality.But, as always with observational research that attempts to connect the dots between diet and health, the key question is whether the meat itself, or something else associated with a meat-heavy lifestyle, is actually causing the bad outcomes.That’s a hard question to answer, but there are clues that people who eat a lot of meat are very different from people who eat a little.Let’s look at a study, published in JAMA Internal Medicine, cited by the EAT-Lancet report; it has a convenient demographic summary. According to it, people in the top one-fifth of meat eaters are different from people in the bottom fifth in a lot of important ways: They weigh more, they’re more likely to smoke, they’re not as well-educated, they get less exercise, and they report lower intakes of fruit, vegetables and fiber. On the plus side, they report drinking less alcohol. But other than that, we’re looking at a litany of markers for a lifestyle that’s not particularly health-conscious.So, to suss out whether it’s the meat that’s raising disease risk, you have to somehow correct for any of the differences on that list — and most of that information also comes from observational research, so even the confounders are confounded.Then there are the things you can’t correct for. Sleep quality, depression and screen time, for example, all correlate with some of the same diseases meat correlates with, but most studies have no information on those.All this confounding explains one of my all-time favorite findings from observational research. It comes from the same study the demographics came from (analyzed in a 2015 paper). Sure enough, the people who ate the most meat were more likely to die of cancer and heart disease, but they were also more likely to die in accidents. And the biggest difference came from the catchall category “all others,” which invariably includes causes of death that have nothing to do with meat.Basically, there’s a very simple problem with relying on observational research: People who eat a lot of meat are very different from people who eat less of it. The meat definitely isn’t causing the accidental deaths (unless, perhaps, they’re tragic backyard grill mishaps), and it isn’t causing at least some of the “all others” deaths, so we know that heavy and light meat-eaters are different in all kinds of ways.That’s where controlled trials come in.In a perfect world, we could figure this out by keeping a large group of people captive for a lifetime, feeding half of them meat, and seeing what happens. Okay, maybe that’s not a perfect world, but it would be the best solution to this particular problem.Instead, we have trials that are short-term (because of logistics and cost), and necessarily rely on markers for disease, rather than the disease itself. For that to be useful, you need a marker that’s a reliable indicator. For a lot of diseases — including cancer — those are hard to come by. For heart disease, we have a good one: low-density lipoprotein (LDL) cholesterol. So, most of the controlled trials of meat-eating focus on heart disease.If you spend some time reading those trials (and I did, so you don’t have to), you find that most of them show some increase in LDL cholesterol, although it’s generally small.A 2025 analysis of 44 controlled trials on meat found that the only ones showing positive cardiovascular outcomes had links to the meat industry, and even then, only about one in five came out positive. Of the independent studies, about three-quarters showed negative outcomes, and the remaining one-quarter was neutral.This isn’t surprising. Red meat contains saturated fat, and we have countless trials that demonstrate sat fat’s ability to raise LDL. But if the meat you eat is relatively lean, that effect is going to be small.The lesson here is that we don’t have a lot of good evidence on meat and health. The observational evidence is hopelessly confounded, and the evidence from clinical trials is woefully limited. There’s so much we simply don’t know. There may be other ways meat raises risk (leading to over-absorption of heme iron and stimulating the production of TMAO, or trimethylamine N-oxide), but there’s little definitive evidence for them. And, of course, there’s the question of what you eat instead. If you’re eating red meat instead of, say, instant ramen, that may be an improvement. If, instead, you’re cutting back on your lentils, not so much.As always, the single-most important thing to remember about nutrition is that what we know is absolutely dwarfed by what we don’t know. Which means that, if you’re making decisions based on what we do know, you could very well be wrong.So what’s an eater to do? Meat is a nutritious food. In fact, animal foods are the only natural sources of a vitamin we need — B12 — which is an indication that we evolved with meat and dairy as part of our diet. It’s very hard to know whether eating some lean meat leads to better outcomes than eating no meat, but I think some meat is a good hedge against all that uncertainty. (The ethical and environmental concerns are also important, but for today let’s focus on health.)But plant foods are also nutritious. And eating a wide variety of them is also a good hedge against uncertainty. Which means the carnivore diet — all meat, all the time! — is a pretty bad bet.Unfortunately, “uncertainty” is not a word that features prominently in the Meat Wars. Instead, we have an unappetizing combination of nastiness and sanctimony, with each camp convinced that the truth and the light are on their side.Not that this is a metaphor for our times or anything.

Animals
Food
Health

New Wildlife Books for Children and Teens (That Adults May Find Interesting Too)

These books for young readers will delight and encourage interest in mammals, insects, octopuses, and other creatures in our shared environment. The post New Wildlife Books for Children and Teens (That Adults May Find Interesting Too) appeared first on The Revelator.

Creating excitement about our amazing planet in young people has never been more important. A pack of new books make environmental science fun and fascinating, teaching children, teens, and even some adults just how diverse and rich our planet’s wildlife and their habitats are to behold. Reading them can encourage us all to become better guardians of the Earth. We’ve adapted the books’ official descriptions below and provided links to the publishers’ sites, but you should also be able to find these books in a variety of formats through your local bookstore or library. Insectopolis By Peter Kuper Award-winning cartoonist Peter Kuper transports readers through the 400-million-year history of insects and the remarkable entomologists who have studied them. This visually immersive work of graphic non-fiction dives into a world where ants, cicadas, bees, and butterflies visit a library exhibition that displays their stories and humanity’s connection to them throughout the ages. Layering history and science, color and design, it tells the remarkable tales of dung beetles navigating by the stars, hawk-size prehistoric dragonflies hunting prey, and mosquitoes changing the course of human history. Read our interview with Kuper. They Work: Honey Bees, Nature’s Pollinators By June Smalls and illustrator Yukari Mishima The newest addition to June Smalls’s nature series, this is a gorgeous nonfiction picture book about life for a hive of honeybees, complete with factoids. Readers learn about the beehive queen, who fights to be queen from the moment she breaks out of her cell. Her job is important, but a hive is only successful if many, many bees are working together. Experience the life cycle of the honeybee up close and personal with this striking picture book. Told in a poetic style along with fun facts on each page for older readers wanting a deeper dive, this book is a beautiful exploration of life inside a beehive — as well as the dangers and predators bees face in the world, including humans. Bison: Community Builders and Grassland Caretakers By Frances Backhouse Bison are North America’s largest land animals. Some 170,000 wood bison once roamed northern regions, while at least 30 million plains bison trekked across the rest of the continent. Almost driven to extinction in the 1800s by decades of slaughter and hunting, this ecological and cultural species supports biodiversity and strengthens the ecosystems around it. This book celebrates the traditions and teachings of Indigenous peoples and looks at how bison lovers of all backgrounds came together to save these iconic animals. Learn about the places where bison are regaining a hoof-hold and meet some of the young people welcoming them back home. Many Things Under a Rock: The Mysteries of Octopuses by David Scheel and Laurel ‘Yoyo’ Scheel This compelling middle-grade adaptation dives deep into the mysteries of one of our planet’s most enigmatic animals. Among all the ocean’s creatures, few are more captivating — or more elusive — than the octopus. Marine biologist David Scheel investigates these strange beings to answer long-held questions: How can we learn more about animals whose perfect camouflage and secretive habitats make them invisible to detection? How does an almost-boneless package of muscle and protein defeat sharks, eels, and other predators while also preying on the most heavily armored animals in the sea? How do octopuses’ bodies work? This fascinating book shows young readers how to embrace the wisdom of the unknown — even if it has more arms than expected. Animal Partnerships: Radical Relationships, Unlikely Alliances, and Other Animal Teams By Ben Hoare and Asia Orlando Discover partnerships from across the animal kingdom with unexpected animal teams around the world who thrive in the wild as they defend, feed, and plot with each other to survive. Friendly, informative explanations are paired with striking photographs and colorful illustrations to make every page captivate the imagination. This unique animal book for children offers impressive facts about previously unknown animal behaviors that are guaranteed to wow adults and children alike. Conker and the Monkey Trap By Hannah Peckham Deep in the jungle, a chameleon named Conker finds two animals in need of his help. Though he first wants to run and hide, he remembers what his mom taught him about being kind and helpful to others. Once Conker saves Sanjeet the lost lorikeet from a puddle, the two of them come across a monkey caught in a trap. Conker and his new friend work together to save the day. This sweet rhyming story will teach young readers the value of friendship and helping those in need. There are plenty of points for discussion and those are aided by the probing questions at the back of the book and the various activities. Mollusks By Kaitlyn Salvatore From the Discover More: Marine Wildlife Series. Not all marine wildlife lives completely underwater. While some mollusks do, other species live both above and below the water’s surface. As readers learn about the different classes of mollusks, they uncover how a mollusk’s body allows it to do amazing things, learning about the unique ways different mollusk species, from slugs to squid to clams, contribute to their environments. Their lifestyles, diet, and the threats to their survival come to life through vivid photographs and age-appropriate text. Becoming an Ecologist: Career Pathways in Science By John A. Wiens What influences a person’s decision to pursue a career in science? And what factors determine the many possible pathways a budding scientist chooses to follow? John A. Wiens traces his journeys through several subfields of ecology — and gives readers an inside look at how science works. He shares stories from his development as an ornithologist, community ecologist, landscape ecologist, and conservation scientist, recounting the serendipities, discoveries, and joys of this branching career. Wiens explores how an individual’s background and interests, life’s contingencies, the influences of key people, and the culture of a discipline can all shape a scientist’s trajectory. This book explores why ecologists ask the questions they do, how they go about answering them, and what they do when the answers are not what they expected. Bringing together personal narrative with practical guidance for aspiring ecologists, this book provides a window onto a dynamic scientific field — and inspiration for all readers interested in building a career by following their passion for the natural world, presented in an enticing way for young professionals and students. Enjoy these engaging reads and get young friends and family members involved with activities that support our environment and wildlife. We hope you and your children and grandchildren will be motivated to protect and reclaim our environment through these remarkable books. And there’s more to come: We’ll cover more books for young readers in the months ahead. For hundreds of additional environmental books — including many for kids of all ages — visit the Revelator Reads archives. The post New Wildlife Books for Children and Teens (That Adults May Find Interesting Too) appeared first on The Revelator.

Animals
Conservation
Culture

Sea lions keep eating the salmon in the Columbia River. Some lawmakers want to kill more of them

A committee of the U.S. House of Representatives spent more than two hours debating the Pacific Northwest’s sea lion problem.

Pacific Northwest sea lions got the spotlight in a Congressional hearing last week.The U.S. House of Representatives’ Committee on Natural Resources spent nearly two and a half hours Wednesday debating the long-standing issue of the Columbia River sea lions, who are known to feast on the salmon that swim down and upriver. It wasn’t great news for the sea lions, as the debate centered primarily around how best to kill the pinnipeds. The hearing featured testimony from Aja DeCoteau, executive director of the Columbia River Inter-Tribal Fishing Commission, who urged the committee to expand efforts to remove the animals and research the problem, The Columbian reported. “Historically, our elders remember an occasional sea lion reaching Celilo Falls,” DeCoteau said at the hearing. “However, these occurrences were rare. Now, a combination of hydro-system infrastructure, changing environmental conditions and the success of the Marine Mammal Protection Act has resulted in unprecedented numbers of sea lions in the Columbia River.”For years, state wildlife managers have sought ways to keep sea lions from gobbling up salmon. Exclusion gates have been installed at the entrances to fish ladders. Sea lions have been hazed with underwater explosives and firecracker shells fired from shotguns. Agencies have tried using fake orcas and arm-flailing inflatables. Animals that have been trapped and relocated, driven hundreds of miles and released into the ocean, have returned upriver within days.In 2008, Oregon was given permission to kill some of the sea lions, though officials were required to capture and brand individual animals, and catch them in the act of consuming salmon, before they could euthanize. The frustrated efforts led to a 2020 federal law that permitted Oregon, Washington and Idaho, as well as some tribes, to bypass the 1972 Marine Mammal Protection Act, allowing them to trap and kill up to 540 California sea lions and 176 Steller sea lions from the Columbia River and its tributaries. In the five years since, only 230 total sea lions have been killed.While the 2020 federal permit to kill the sea lions was renewed without controversy this September, extending the law through 2030, lawmakers are now examining how effective the legislative efforts have actually been. Rep. Marie Gluesenkamp Perez, a Democrat who represents Washington’s 3rd Congressional District, which runs along the lower Columbia River, sat in on the Congressional committee Wednesday, asking why more sea lions haven’t been killed.“Ask yourself, why are these numbers so small?” she said. Gluesenkamp Perez argued the removal process is arduous and expensive, estimating the cost of removing one sea lion at $38,000, or roughly $203 per salmon saved.She recommended expanding the reach of the permits and suggested a process that would allow local fisherman and tribal members to bid on permits to assist with sea lion killings. “I have seen and heard firsthand how much work goes into managing sea lion populations and preserving local fisheries,” she added. “As the name implies, sea lions are a species that belong in the sea, not in our rivers.” Larry Phillips, policy director for the American Sportfishing Association, who also testified before the committee Wednesday, said he thought people would “line up” to participate in sea lion removals.“I also think that we need to be really careful, make sure we’re investing in good science to monitor the outcomes of any type of programs that we implement or decide to implement, and that’s that clearly is going to be the foundation of how we move forward,” Phillips said. “But you know, I would certainly support being creative and coming up with unique ideas.” Killing sea lions in the Pacific Northwest has long been a contentious issue. A 2023 video of a fishing boat repeatedly charging large groups of sea lions demonstrated the animosity many fishers feel toward sea lions, though it shocked even fellow anglers, who condemned the act of aggression toward the animals.

Animals
Resources
Science

Suggested Viewing

TO SEE THE SNOW LEOPARD

“To see a snow leopard is to see God.” It’s a film about the search of the snow leopard - a beautiful and rare animal. There are only a few thousand of them left on the planet. Most of the animals have been given names but almost no one has seen them. This is a story about the mystery of human’s contact with another life, with wild nature, and the search for the lost source of inner strength. Scientists, hunters, shamans, tourists - the leopard sees them, but they do not see him.

Animals

When Worlds Collide: A Formosan Black Bear's Deadly Dance with Civilization

This is the true story of one Formosan black bear’s encounter with civilization. A fateful encounter with a wild boar trap in mid-autumn 2019 first brought this bear to national attention. However, after months of recuperation and subsequent release back into the wild, it lingered worryingly near settled areas, damaging orchards and even ransacking a mountain cabin in search of food. Re-released in a remote forested area, the bear set out an incredible journey across arduous terrain in the direction of home. This is the moving story of “711” … also known as “568” – a wild Formosan black bear from Taichung’s Mt. Daxue area. The bear died on the 25th day of its long journey home in May 2022 in the Mt. Wujie region of Nantou County. News of the death was a devastating blow to the hundreds involved in 711/568’s rescue, recovery, and tracking efforts. It also offered a difficult lesson for us all about the work yet ahead for wildlife conservation. This film examines Formosan black bear conservation from multiple perspectives, including those involved in this bear’s rescue and care, living in areas affected by 711/568, and working in the many public and private organizations dedicated to the cause of wildlife conservation. We hope the story told here helps further raise public understanding and concern for wildlife conservation in Taiwan.

Conservation
Inspirational
Animals

Coming Home - Back to the Wild

They are among the rarest animals in the world: lynxes, European minks, swamp turtles and ground squirrels. They all once disappeared from Germany. In an attempt to rewild Germanys nature, they are now returning. The film follows their individual journeys back to the wild. For those who are now reclaiming their old habitat, it is a long and dangerous road.

Animals
Conservation
Documentary

Microsculpture

Microsculpture is a unique visual experience. A 10mm insect is shown as a 3 meter print, revealing minute detail and allowing the viewer to take in the structure of the insect in its entirety. The beautifully lit, high magnification portraiture of Levon Biss captures the microscopic form of these animals in striking high-resolution detail.

Animals
Science
Culture

Reboot

Humans have exploited Earth to the point where it is no longer possible to live on it. Their only option is to relocate to Mars. When the last group of people has boarded the spaceship for the red planet, the Earth can finally breathe easy. Like an expressionist painting, Reboot depicts a world in which the absence of our species is the only chance nature has to recover its lushness and flourish once more.

Animation
Crisis
Cosmos

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