For everyone out there trying to live sustainably, you might also want to consider the best way for your loved ones to dispose of your body after you're gone. Is a green burial best? What about human composting (where it's legal)? And...

There's a tree species that used to be all over the world. And now, they can only be found in a secret valley in the mountains in Australia. This is the story of the rise and fall of the Wollemi Pine, including how some new tech might...

When it comes to fighting the climate crisis, one thing that we know we need to do is carbon capture and long-term carbon storage. But researchers have been struggling to find ways to actually get this to work. Which is why they've had...

Trees are dead inside. It's true: the xylem tissue that supports their trunks technically isn't alive. Archaeologists hate that because this problem, the old wood problem, can cause carbon dating to be off by hundreds of...

Chocolate being one of the world's most delicious foods, you'd think we would know everything about it. /Somebody/ domesticated wild cacao. It's just… nobody really knows who, or when… or where. But if we want chocolate for the long...

Climate change shakes up all of Earth’s systems, including the living ones. In this episode of Crash Course Biology, we’ll see how climate change’s effects rattle the entire chain of life. Changes felt in one population ripple out to...

Springtime means the arrival of green grass, bright flowers, and buzzing bees. But for many of us, it's also about sneezing, watery red eyes, and a runny nose, thanks to allergies. In this week's video, you'll learn why we get allergies,...

Humans can go inside or put on clothes, but trees spend winter naked in the cold. Why don't they all die?

Chantale Zuzi Leader is one of the millions of displaced people around the world. In a deeply moving talk, she reflects on losing her family, home and sense of safety — only to break through and ultimately find community and hope. It's...

Most trees reach for the sun – but not the weeping willow. Why?

Every species on Earth has a fingerprint - whether or not they have fingers at all.

Did our most famous fossil ancestor, Lucy, die by falling out of a tall tree? The answer is part of a decades-long debate over how, exactly, our ancestors transitioned from life in the trees to life on the ground.

The unexpected discovery of an entirely new domain of life was pretty huge and surprising - even if archaea do just look like bacteria. But, in recent years, it’s been their connection to us that's turned out to be particularly full of...

Untangling the origins of Beelzebufo -- the giant frog that lived alongside the dinosaurs -- turns out to be one of the most bedeviling problems in the history of amphibians.

Walk into any forest, and beneath your feet is an elaborate social network that helps make life on Earth possible. It’s called the “Wood Wide Web”, a massive and intricate network of fungi that exchange water, nutrients, and chemical...

How Many Species are in Your Backyard?

The biggest thing that has ever lived on Earth… is a tree? Hard to believe, but it’s true. Travel with me to the Rocky Mountains of Colorado to go inside the most massive species on our planet, and learn what unique and special...

There’s a lot of confusion out there about what is and isn’t a dinosaur. And you’d be forgiven for being kinda confused. Maybe paleontologists are just messing with us. Or… maybe the question of what is and isn’t a dinosaur goes deeper...

Can trees really save us from climate change? For eons, nature has relied on photosynthesis as a big way to keep carbon dioxide levels from getting out of control. But as we have put more carbon into the air, we’ve also cut down many of...

Artist Ersin Han Ersin invites us to step inside a giant sequoia tree, peering through the bark into the tapestry of life within. Discover how his multisensory installations explore the concept of "umwelt," or the unique sensory...

We tend to think of evolution as a slow, gradual process playing out over millions of years. But evolutionary biologist Shane Campbell-Staton says nature is now changing at breakneck speed to keep up with the world humanity has built....

If you see an acorn sprout under an oak tree, you're seeing that tree's grandchild. Here's why half of all higher plants are invisible, and why it works for them.

The tree of life you learned in school is wrong, even if you just graduated. We like to sort eukaryotes into big kingdoms or supergroups, but scientists can't agree what those groups should be. Here's why that's a good thing.

Two mushroom guilds with vastly different strategies are locked in competition for forest dominance.