New Scientist

Scientists studying puppy cognition explore the impact of breeding versus training, shed new light on milestones in dogs' cognitive development and reveal science-backed methods to train a "good" dog

About 40 years ago, researchers noticed a population of orcas had begun swimming around with dead fish on their heads, and now the craze is back

Most dogs aren't bred to feel at ease in our homes, but scientists studying puppy cognition have found ways you can help yours adapt

Arthropods belong to an evolutionary branch – the ecdysozoa – that contains about half of all animal species, and the earliest fossil evidence of the group now dates back 550 million years

Groups of wild chimpanzees with more complex tool-using behaviours tend to be genetically linked, providing evidence for cumulative culture in other apes

In the first hearing test of live baleen whales, the animals detected much higher frequency sounds than expected, forcing researchers to reconsider how these mammals respond to predators – and humans

Growing wood directly from stem cells could offer an alternative to cutting threatened hardwood trees, but it isn't clear if it has same properties as actual wood

Endangered Ethiopian wolves feed on the nectar of red hot poker plants, and may transport pollen from flower to flower as they do so

Research highlights impacts of military sonar devices on dolphin behaviour

Tiny, solid windows in the shells of heart cockles let in light for the photosynthetic algae inside them – and they could show us how to make better fibre-optic cables

Four southern giant hornets have been identified in northern Spain, leading to concerns that the species could harm native insects if it becomes widespread

Several populations of Mexican tetra fish that live in darkness have independently evolved to need hardly any sleep, but the reason why is a mystery

A genetic flaw dooms half of all crested newts to die before they hatch – now we know how this baffling evolutionary quirk came about

Evidence that animals mourn the death of loved ones is growing, but we should be wary of letting our biases cloud this topic, says philosopher Susana Monsó

Palaeontologists have pieced together the brain structure of a bird that lived 80 million years ago named Navaornis hestiae, thanks to a remarkably well-preserved fossil  

Eurasian reed warblers don’t just get a sense of direction from Earth’s magnetic field – they can also calculate their coordinates on a mental map

Campaigners are calling for stricter controls on rodenticides after finding that birds of prey in England are increasingly being exposed to high doses of rat poison

Never underestimate what a single gopher can achieve in a day: one of the burrowing mammals helped boost soil fungi in an area blanketed by ash from the explosive eruption of Mount St Helens in Washington state

Experiments show that illuminating the underside of a decoy seal reduces attacks by great white sharks, revealing a possible strategy to protect surfers and swimmers

An analysis of thousands of cognitive tests carried out by chimpanzees finds that the number of spectators influenced their performance in different ways depending on the difficulty of the task