About 500 million years ago, not a single creature had a skull. Over time, these bony plates evolved into the structural marvels that vertebrates—animals with spinal cords, aka you, me, and your pug, ...

Scientists are listening in on sperm whale conversations and studying Earth's strangest microbes to prepare humanity for first contact with extraterrestrial life. Tardigrades—a type of invertebrate ...

By studying Earth's toughest microbes and complex animal "speech", scientists are reshaping how we search for – and may someday talk to – alien life.