TED Talks
TED: A bold plan to protect 30 percent of the Earth's surface and ocean floor | Enric Sala
As a diver in the 1970s, marine ecologist Enric Sala saw once-lush oceanscapes reduced to underwater deserts -- but later, in marine preserves across the globe, he also witnessed the ocean's power to rejuvenate itself when left to its...
TED Talks
Melissa Garren: The sea we've hardly seen
An average teaspoon of ocean water contains five million bacteria and fifty million viruses -- and yet we are just starting to discover how these "invisible engineers" control our ocean's chemistry. At TEDxMonterey, Melissa Garren sheds...
TED-Ed
TED-Ed: Why is biodiversity so important? - Kim Preshoff
Our planet's diverse, thriving ecosystems may seem like permanent fixtures, but they're actually vulnerable to collapse. Jungles can become deserts, and reefs can become lifeless rocks. What makes one ecosystem strong and another weak in...
TED-Ed
TED-Ed: The big-beaked, rock-munching fish that protect coral reefs | Mike Gil
As the sun rises over a quiet coral reef, one animal breaks the morning silence. Named for its vibrant scales and beak-like teeth, the parrotfish devours a particularly crunchy breakfast: rocks. Why would any creature take bites out of...
TED Talks
Craig Venter: Sampling the ocean's DNA
Genomics pioneer Craig Venter takes a break from his epic round-the-world expedition to talk about the millions of genes his team has discovered so far in its quest to map the ocean's biodiversity.
TED Talks
TED: An economic case for protecting the planet | Naoko Ishii
We all share one planet -- we breathe the same air, drink the same water and depend on the same oceans, forests and biodiversity. economist Naoko Ishii is on a mission to protect these shared resources, known as the global commons, that...
TED Talks
TED: What we don't know about mother's milk | Katie Hinde
Breast milk grows babies' bodies, fuels neurodevelopment, provides essential immunofactors and safeguards against famine and disease -- why, then, does science know more about tomatoes than mother's milk? Katie Hinde shares insights into...
TED Talks
TED: Ecology from the air | Greg Asner
What are our forests really made of? From the air, ecologist Greg Asner uses a spectrometer and high-powered lasers to map nature in meticulous kaleidoscopic 3D detail -- what he calls "a very high-tech accounting system" of carbon. In...
TED Talks
Cary Fowler: One seed at a time, protecting the future of food
The wheat, corn and rice we grow today may not thrive in a future threatened by climate change. Cary Fowler takes us inside the Svalbard Global Seed Vault, a vast treasury buried within a frozen mountain in Norway, that stores a diverse...
TED Talks
Marla Spivak: Why bees are disappearing
Honeybees have thrived for 50 million years, each colony 40 to 50,000 individuals coordinated in amazing harmony. So why, seven years ago, did colonies start dying en masse? Marla Spivak reveals four reasons which are interacting with...
Be Smart
How Baby Sea Turtles Find Their Way Home
Find out how baby sea turtles find their way home after hatching!
TED Talks
TED: We can reprogram life. How to do it wisely | Juan enriquez
For four billion years, what lived and died on earth depended on two principles: natural selection and random mutation. Then humans came along and changed everything - hybridizing plants, breeding animals, altering the environment and...
TED Talks
Jessica Green: We're covered in germs. Let's design for that.
Our bodies and homes are covered in microbes -- some good for us, some bad for us. As we learn more about the germs and microbes who share our living spaces, TED Fellow Jessica Green asks: Can we design buildings that encourage happy,...
TED Talks
TED: How to win at evolution and survive a mass extinction | Lauren Sallan
Congratulations! By being here, alive, you are one of history's winners -- the culmination of a success story four billion years in the making. The other 99 percent of species who have ever lived on earth are dead -- killed by fire,...
TED-Ed
TED-Ed: How we can detect pretty much anything | Hélène Morlon and Anna Papadopoulou
Scientists have been staking out a forest in Montana for an animal that's notoriously tricky to find. Camera traps haven't offered definitive evidence, and experts can't identify its tracks with certainty. But within the past decades,...
TED Talks
Barbara J. King: Grief and love in the animal kingdom
From mourning orcas to distressed elephants, biological anthropologist Barbara J. King has witnessed grief and love across the animal kingdom. In this eye-opening talk, she explains the evidence behind her belief that many animals...
TED Talks
Juan Enriquez: Using biology to rethink the energy challenge
Juan Enriquez challenges our definition of bioenergy. Oil, coal, gas and other hydrocarbons are not chemical but biological products, based on plant matter -- and thus, growable. Our whole approach to fuel, he argues, needs to change.
TED Talks
TED: How human noise affects ocean habitats | Kate Stafford
Oceanographer Kate Stafford lowers us into the sonically rich depths of the Arctic Ocean, where ice groans, whales sing to communicate over vast distances -- and climate change and human noise threaten to alter the environment in ways we...
TED Talks
TED: The tiny creature that secretly powers the planet | Penny Chisholm
Oceanographer Penny Chisholm introduces us to an amazing little being: Prochlorococcus, the most abundant photosynthetic species on the planet. A marine microbe that has existed for millions of years, Prochlorococcus wasn't discovered...
TED-Ed
Why didn't this 2,000 year old body decompose? | Carolyn Marshall
It may not appear very lively six feet underground, but a single teaspoon of soil contains more organisms than there are human beings on the planet. From bacteria and algae to fungi and protozoa, soils are home to one quarter of Earth's...
TED Talks
Victoria Gill: What a nun can teach a scientist about ecology
To save the achoque -- an exotic (and adorable) salamander found in a lake in northern Mexico -- scientists teamed up with an unexpected research partner: a group of nuns called the Sisters of the Immaculate Health. In this delightful...
SciShow
The Tree of Life Is Messed Up
Taxonomy is a powerful tool, and one that modern biology wouldn't be able to function without. But trying to shoehorn the messy, complicated web of interrelationships that is biology into neat boxes has resulted in a pretty messy tree of...
TED Talks
Emma Teeling: The secret of the bat genome
In Western society, bats are often characterized as creepy, even evil. Zoologist Emma Teeling encourages us to rethink common attitudes toward bats, whose unique and fascinating biology gives us insight into our own genetic makeup.
SciShow
DNA and Dung Beetles
Chapters View all CARL LINNAEUS 1:24 20% OF KNOWN SPECIES 1:38 NOT 100 MILLION 1:51 DEEP SEA LOBSTERS 2:25 VENEZUELAN SNAIL 2:28 FISH COUNT 2:39