New Discoveries

Recent Animal Discoveries

Virgin Birth

Leopard Shark. Rodger Klein/Getty Images

A female Zebra Shark in an aquarium in Dubai has given birth for a fourth time to live young without ever having contact with a male. All of the offspring are female because they have no male chromosome, but the genes mix and recombine to create offspring that are not exact clones of their mother. Parthenogenesis, or virgin birth, while rare has been found to occur in other animals, such as some species of reptiles and amphibians, and other fish species including sharks.

Read the full story from The National here.

New Species of Dolphin

Burrunan dolphin off of the coast of Australia. AFP/Monash/K Charlton Robb

Dolphins living in a tiny area off of southeastern Australia have recently been found to be a new species. Previously thought to be common bottlenose dolphins found along southern Australia, DNA and genetic analyses among other studies have revealed a number of unique features. They are now classified as a new species of bottlenose dolphin, Tursiops australis, and given the common name of Burrunan dolphin, Aboriginal Australian for "large sea fish of the porpoise kind."

Read the full story from National Geographic here.

Hybrid Sharks Discovered

Black Tip Reef Shark.
Kydd Pollock/Marine Photobank

Hybrid sharks - a mix between the Australian blacktip shark and the common blacktip shark - may be evidence of climate change adaptation, according to scientists.

Read more about this newly discovered species here.