New Scientist

Our ability to exert conscious control over our family sizes is unique – and can be transformational, says Christopher Wills

A big rethink of our planet’s early years adds to growing fossil, chemical and DNA evidence that Earth was only a few hundred million years old when life began

Up to 100,000 extraordinary species, from spiders and beetles to salamanders and fish, live in subterranean caves and cracks. They aren’t as safe down there as we thought

Male fireflies caught in an orb-weaver spider’s web start flashing in an unusual pattern, a deadly deception that seems to attract additional victims for the spider

See the incredible shots that have won this year's BMC Ecology and Evolution and BMC Zoology Image Competition

The noises made by organisms like ants and worms as they move around in the soil can be used to assess whether an ecosystem is in good shape

Scientists have known for centuries that sunflowers wobble in seemingly random ways as they grow – but it seems that those movements actually optimise how much light each plant gets

Is it worth including activated charcoal in your terrarium’s potting mix? James Wong isn’t convinced by this pricey product

From birds and bats to horses and great apes, Bill Schutt's seriously fun history of teeth, Bite, explains their role in both shaping evolution and our understanding of it

This week, we journey to the early 2030s, when machine learning first allowed us to communicate with sperm whales. Rowan Hooper tells us what they have to say

It's time to expect the unexpected, says Natalie Cabrol, one of the world's top astrobiologists and author of an authoritative book on the hunt for life's origins – and ET

The South American lungfish has a whopping 180 gigabases of DNA in each cell, compared with 6 gigabases in human cells

Lab-reared German cockroaches are susceptible to consumer insecticide sprays, allowing manufacturers to pass US regulatory tests, but insects taken from real-world infestations are able to shrug off the products

Invasive cane toads have decimated native freshwater crocodile populations in northern Australia, as the predators don't know they should avoid the toxic amphibians

The Maugean skate (Zearaja maugeana) is only found in one habitat in Australia, which is under threat from human activity. Now the species has been saved from extinction by hatching in captivity

All living creatures use only the left or right-handed forms of certain molecules, and now we might understand why

Two nankeen kestrels have been filmed flying in a wind tunnel to learn how the raptors keep their heads in a fixed position under turbulent conditions

Microwaves in homes, offices and laboratories have been found to host diverse microbiomes, highlighting the importance of regular cleaning

Blackworms are ultra-fast swimmers, and they tangle up into worm balls to protect themselves from predators – but leeches have an ingenious method of catching them called “spiral entombment”

An estimate of annual bird fatalities due to building collisions in the US brings the figure to more than 1 billion – it is the first to include deaths from injuries after the strike