...a new study, led by researchers from the University of Bristol, has found out how these remarkable creatures evolved by comparing their fossil records with the evolutionary history chronicled in their gene sequences to shed light on their origins. Published today in Proceedings of the Royal Society B, it shows that the cephalopods diversified into the familiar modern octopuses, cuttlefish and squid during a time of great change in the marine world, known as the Mesozoic Marine Revolution, 160 to 100 million years in the past. Read more
For four years and five months, she clung to the rock and guarded her eggs. In a feat that surely made good use of all eight arms, an octopus revealed a new secret of deep sea life when ecologists observed her record-breaking behaviour from a robotic submarine. This doubles the longest brooding time ever seen in the animal kingdom, giving embryos time to develop in the cold. Read more