A striking photograph of two male saiga antelope sparring on the banks of a steppe lake is the winner of the 2025 BMC Ecology and Evolution and BMC Zoology image competition.

The discovery of yet another unique animal species from Rēkohu Chatham Islands illustrates how the physical qualities of an animal are influenced by its surroundings.

The next time you breathe, consider this: photosynthesis of algae, powered by iron dust in the ocean, made it possible.  Now, a new Rutgers University study published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences pulls back the curtain on this vital process.

Iron is a critical micronutrient for marine phytoplankton, the microscopic algae that form the foundation of the ocean’s food webs. It is deposited into the world’s oceans as dust from deserts and arid areas as well as from glacial meltwater.

Subunits of the six-subunit origin-recognition complex plays an unexpectedly broad role in the regulation of human cell gene expression, according to the first detailed study of how and where ORC acts. The subunit ORC2 in particular repressed or activated genes, changed epigenetic markers and altered DNA loop formation, findings that open new chapters in ORC biology.