Unlike in fiction, giant whales do not emerge fully-formed from the ocean deep. So, where did Livyatan melvillei come from? How did such a large predator live? And what caused the titan to die out? The answer may lie in an appetite so...

This is the hundred-year tale of how an unlikely bunch of bottom-dwelling marine critters helped reveal that ocean basins are basically reincarnated every few hundred million years.

After having solved the small matter of evolution by natural selection - becoming one of the most famous scientists in the world in the process - Charles Darwin turned his focus to a different personal obsession…

This is the story of how our planet rescued itself from extreme conditions in the Cretaceous Period, at the cost of essentially suffocating the oceans for half-a-million years.

What graptolites tell us is a story of incredible changes in the ocean, of periods where the oceans became poisonous and suffocating before eventually clearing up again. They unlock extinctions and recoveries that scientists didn't see....

Turns out, instead of having bats to thank for the existence of butterflies, the groups we should actually be thanking are…bees and beans.

To get fire, which exists only on Earth, it took billions of years of photosynthesis – which means fire can’t exist without life. And fire and life have been shaping each other ever since.

Researchers have discovered a piece of a weird, but critical, time in the deep past…a time when the first-ever mass extinction may have turned Planet Earth into Sponge World.

What did life look like when the Amazon watershed flowed backwards? How did its direction shape the evolution of life around it? And what force could have possibly been strong enough to up-end one of the world’s mightiest rivers between...

We all know Charles Darwin's theory of evolution, right? Natural selection? But what about his lesser-know theory of evolution: sexual selection. Let’s talk about how animals like peacocks, whose eye-catching physical traits make them...

What does it mean to be a “semi-aquatic” dinosaur? Was it wading in the shallows, or could it have been a skilled swimmer? Each scenario paints a very different picture of Spinosaurus, and the discovery of new fossils has paleontologists...

Join the Amoeba Sisters as they introduce the basics about cladograms and phylogenetic trees. The Amoeba Sisters walk through the process of building a basic cladogram and mention vocabulary such as: shared ancestral character, shared...

Today we're talking about the biggest snakes that ever lived -- like anacondas, pythons, and Titanoboa -- and how they evolved to be so big in the first place. Hosted by: Savannah Geary (they/them)

Sometimes, one animal ends up in an evolutionary arms race with another for millions of years. Here are four fascinating examples, including our own showdown with snakes. Hosted by: Jaida Elcock (she/her)

What’s a human? And how did we become humans, anyway? In this episode of Crash Course Biology, we’ll meet some of our closest relatives and trace how we evolved into the brainy, inventive, complex species we are today.

Everywhere you look on Earth, you’ll find wonderful and diverse living things, from tiny tardigrades to soaring sequoias. And incredibly, everything alive today, and everything that’s ever lived, is related. In this episode of Crash...

In this episode of Crash Course Biology, we’ll learn about the ways population genetics reveals how groups of living things evolve—by comparing genetic similarities and differences. We’ll discover the most genetically diverse species of...

Crocodiles, and birds, and dinosaurs—oh my! While classifying organisms is nothing new, phylogeny— or, grouping organisms by their evolutionary relationships—is helping us see life in a whole new light. In this episode of Crash Course...

Humans may have been around for a long time, but life has existed for way longer. In this episode of Crash Course Biology, we’ll journey through deep time to uncover the history of life on Earth. We’ll explore the big, game-changing...

How can you tell two species apart? It’s not always simple. In this episode of Crash Course Biology, we’ll learn about speciation—a process that can happen over millions of years, or within a single generation. Along the way, we’ll...

There are lots of ways that evolution happens, and natural selection is just one of them. In this episode of Crash Course Biology, we’ll find out how this process works and shapes traits in all living things —from ginkgo trees to howler...

Whether we’re talking about tigers, trees, or tarantulas, evolution happens at the level of the population. In this episode of Crash Course Biology, we’ll find out how natural selection, gene flow, genetic drift, and other processes...

AI is transforming the way we work — could it also reshape what makes us human? In this quick and insightful talk, evolutionary anthropologist Sarah Blaffer Hrdy explores how the human brain was shaped by millions of years of shared...

Two species of Demodex mites specifically inhabit human follicles. And not just some people’s— nearly everyone is thought to host mites. One person’s face might harbor hundreds or even thousands of individual mites. On any given day,...