New Species | Science News, Articles, Stories

#74: Meet the Megavirus 

Scientists find the world's largest virus. 12.22.2011

#63: How Many Species Inhabit the Earth? 

It's a tough question, but we now have the best answer yet. 12.22.2011

#49: Arsenic-Based Life Shakes Up Science (Again)

Rosie Redfield takes scientific controversy out into the open. 12.22.2011

World's Deepest Known Animal: Worm That Lives Under Almost a Mile of Rock

Researchers dubbed it "Halicephalobus mephisto," from the Greek for “he who loves not the light.” 10.12.2011

Homo Sapiens, Meet Your New Astounding Family

Once we shared the planet with other  human species,  competing with them and interbreeding with them. Today  we stand alone, but our rivals’ genes live on inside us—even as their remarkable stories are only  now coming to light. 07.28.2011

#50: Giant Ancient Fish Fed Like Whales 

12.16.2010

The 100 Top Science Stories of 2010

Every year DISCOVER sorts through the scientific accomplishments of the past 12 months, and assembles a list of the coolest experiments, most brilliant discoveries, and most world-changing events. As you page through the countdown to the #1 science story, we think you'll come to the same conclusion we did: 2010 was quite a year. 12.16.2010

When Animals Attack Our Attempts to Categorize Them

For three centuries, scientists have divided living things into tidy species. But the real world seems more slippery: a continuum in which one variety of life flows seamlessly into the next. 11.19.2010

#33: The Most Amazing New Species of the Year

The smallest snake, biggest stick insect, smallest sea horse, and a tree that kills itself by flowering. 01.25.2010

#90: Fossil Bonanza for an Animal That Doesn't Fossilize: The Octopus

“The preservation of these soft-bodied creatures is the result of a chain of lucky chances.” Paleontologists hit the luckiest stash of all in Lebanon. 12.18.2009

Jane Goodall on the Lazarus Effect

Rediscovery of a long-lost species sends a message of hope about second chances for all of us. Goodall relates two beautiful examples: the tiny Caspian horse and the Lord Howe Island phasmid (it's a bug). 09.16.2009