Our Blog
Note to readers: ‘Biological Expositions’ is a series of blog-posts each of which is equivalent in content to a book chapter. If a bio-bullet is likened to a starter, our routine blog-post could be seen as a light lunch and a biological exposition as a three course meal. We look forward to your comments on this series.
The paradox of the fire-loving crayfishes
Buttongrass as a pyrotechnic engineer. Prof. Mumblebard claims: “Through evolutionary time, fire has controlled the structure of vegetation, determining whether a landscape...
Archaeopteryx is neither a first bird nor a bird in the first place
The steenbok is uniquely diminutive among the ungulates of semi-desert dunes and plains. Prof. Mumblebard claims: "Archaeopteryx has stood the test of time as a primitive bird...
Aposematic uniformism in butterflies versus mob-mentality in forest birds
Is Müllerian mimicry a misnomer and a non-concept in Lepidoptera? Prof. Mumblebard claims: “Coexisting butterflies with warning colouration tend to resemble each other even...
Plumosaurs flew as dinosaurs, not as proto-birds
Some feathered reptiles evolved into birds, but others flew in parallel right until all dinosaurs died. Prof. Mumblebard claims: “Flapping flight has only evolved thrice in the...
Authentic mega-killers kept their mouths shut
Why would any felid flaunt what’s obvious? Prof. Mumblebard claims: “The extinct Smilodon, largest of all sabretooth cats, is particularly well-known because of the unusually...
Five newly revealed ‘conspicu-cats’
Black-and-white armbands remind bullies that small cats can punch above their weight. Prof. Mumblebard claims: “Skunks defend themselves by spraying obnoxious...
What lies behind the kidney’s iron curtain?
Despite its rusty colour, urine is revealingly rust-free. Prof. Mumblebard claims: “A main function of the human kidney is to excrete toxic substances including any excesses of...
Which predatory identity does this goby mimic?
Eyespots on the dorsal fins of the twinspot goby are startling for the overlooked coexistence of a family of fierce crabs. Prof. Mumblebard claims: “Like other ocellated animals,...
An explanation for sexual skew in the priapiumfish
Extremely complex pudenda occur in some of the smallest of vertebrates. Prof. Mumblebard claims: “The position and the proportional size and complexity of the intromittent organ...
Coital fanging in a giant cartilaginous fish
The longest tooth of the basking shark is a phallic grapple of the vagina. Prof. Mumblebard claims: “It is axiomatic that dentition and genitalia are mutually exclusive in the...
Does rickets show clinical deficiency of boron?
The quintessential osseous mineral is one scarcer than calcium. Prof. Mumblebard claims: “Regardless of the semantics of whether it is a vitamin or a prohormone, calciferol...
When does parroting qualify as speech?
Parrots speak with us in the same sense that we swim with the dolphins. Prof. Mumblebard claims: "It goes without saying that no animal can speak any human language. Admittedly...
D stands for delete as vitamin
The brightest of steroid hormones is also the most confused. Prof. Mumblebard claims: "Vitamin D is a good example of a vitamin because it is required in small amounts, is...
Anglophone biology suffers from orange-blindness
Yellowred may be a funny colour, but its denial by mammalogists is even funnier. Prof. Mumblebard claims: "It is understandable that extremely few mammal species are called...
A new vitamin hiding in plain light
One secret of balanced nutrition may be a malodorous acid which human cells cannot make for themselves. Prof. Mumblebard claims: "Osteoporosis and skin cancer are both caused by...
Cancer as a perverse revolution back to the primordial germ
When fomented in oxidant shadows and fuelled by sugary blood, an internal rebellion can turn cancerous. Prof. Mumblebard claims: “Cancer is caused by cells that suffer random...
Seeing the light for the trees
The mainstream logic, that trees outgrow each other to compete for light, cannot stand acute scrutiny. Prof. Mumblebard claims: “Competition for light is a textbook example of a...
The nutritional wings of the tallest of all flightless birds
The reason why moa filled niches usually associated with mammals was an unappreciated poverty of crucial nutrients. Three trace elements gave birds a particular physiological...
Fat mephitids not allowed in the Old World
Did human ascent preclude skunk survival? Prof. Mumblebard claims: “In the New World, the skunk family is widespread from central Canada in the north to Patagonia in the south....
Why no native counterparts for eucalypts in southern Africa?
With so many ancestral myrtles to shape, there must be a good reason why natural selection said no to the idea of African eucalypts. Prof. Mumblebard claims: "Although Australia...
What is the real value of a kidney?
Remembering that even the heartbeat was misunderstood for centuries, could the kidney yet prove to be . . . an oxido-transformer? Prof. Mumblebard claims: "Renal function is no...