Topic description and stories

Life on Earth is at risk from an unprecedented rate of environmental change that threatens the natural resources on which we depend.

Gorillas found to live in 'complex' societies, suggesting deep roots of human social evolution

10 Jul 2019

Algorithms reveal “social tiers” in gorillas seen in only a few other species, such as dolphins and humans. Researchers suggest that some of these...

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L-R: Knysna Turaco, Great Blue Turaco, Knysna Turaco

Past climate change pushed birds from the northern hemisphere to the tropics

10 Jun 2019

Researchers have shown how millions of years of climate change affected the range and habitat of modern birds, suggesting that many groups of...

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Travelling to a peatland area with the Urarina.

The cultural significance of carbon-storing peatlands to rural communities

21 May 2019

A group of UK and Peruvian researchers have carried out the first detailed study of how rural communities interact with peatlands in the Peruvian...

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Researchers obtain first ever underwater ultrasound scans of wild reef manta rays

30 Apr 2019

A team of researchers from the University of Cambridge and the Manta Trust has successfully scanned a pregnant wild reef manta ray underwater to...

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A farmer with a conservationist in Montana, USA

Conservationists share ‘core aims’ but clash over ways forward, study finds

09 Apr 2019

Research reveals rifts within global movement – from economic approaches to protected areas – while confirming support for aims underpinning it.

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Galapagos finch specimens from Museum of Zoology, collected on the second voyage of HMS Beagle that carried Darwin to the Islands. Researchers say these famously diverse finches are an iconic example of rapid speciation in the tropics.

Species ‘hotspots’ created by immigrant influx or evolutionary speed depending on climate

06 Feb 2019

New research reveals that biodiversity ‘hotspots’ in the tropics produced new species at faster rates over the last 25 million years, but those in...

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Rothiemurchus Forest

Restoring Europe’s endangered landscapes for life

09 Oct 2018

Cambridge Conservation Initiative (CCI) last week unveiled a programme to restore priority landscapes across Europe. The Endangered Landscapes...

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Harvest

‘High-yield’ farming costs the environment less than previously thought – and could help spare habitats

14 Sep 2018

New findings suggest that more intensive agriculture might be the “least bad” option for feeding the world while saving its species – provided use of...

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Illuminating the hidden kingdom of the truffle

12 Feb 2018

Truffles are one of the world’s most expensive ingredients, and also one of the most mysterious. Now, with the help of a 170-year-old ‘living...

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Commercial honeybee hives in the Teide National Park, Tenerife, Spain.

Think of honeybees as ‘livestock’ not wildlife, argue experts

25 Jan 2018

Contrary to public perception, die-offs in honeybee colonies are an agricultural not a conservation issue, argue Cambridge researchers, who say that...

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Black-tailed godwit (Limosa limosa), a waterbird with habitats ranging from the Russian far-east to Europe, Africa, and Australasia.

Political instability and weak governance lead to loss of species, study finds

20 Dec 2017

Big data study of global biodiversity shows ineffective national governance is a better indicator of species decline than any other measure of “...

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Conservationists’ eco-footprints suggest education alone won’t change behaviour

10 Oct 2017

A new study shows that even those presumably best informed on the environment find it hard to consistently “walk the walk”, prompting scientists to...

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