Tag Archives: cuckoos

Golden Algae: They Hunt, They Kill, They Cheat

Cheating is a behavior not limited to humans, animals and plants. Even microscopically small, single-celled algae do it, a team of UA researchers has discovered.

Humans do it, chimpanzees do it, cuckoos do it – cheating to score a free ride is a well-documented behavior by many animals, even plants. But microscopically small, single-celled algae? Yes, they do it too, biologists with the University of Arizona’s department of ecology and evolutionary biology have discovered.

“There are cheaters out there that we didn’t know of,” said William Driscoll, lead author of a research report on the topic who studied an environmentally devastating toxic alga that is invading U.S. waters as part of his doctoral research in the lab of Jeremiah Hackett, an assistant professor of ecology and evolutionary biology. (more…)

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