The evolution of multicellularity represents one of the most consequential transitions in the history of life. This process, in which individual cells coalesce to form integrated and functionally ...

Volvocine algae provide an excellent model for understanding the gradual evolution from unicellularity to complex multicellularity. Spanning a range of organization from simple unicellular forms to ...

To understand the origins of multicelled life, researchers are studying a motley assortment of simpler animal relatives. The commonalities they’re unearthing offer a trove of clues about our mutual ...

Scientists at Nagoya University in Japan have identified the genes that allow an organism to switch between living as single cells and forming multicellular structures. This ability to alternate ...

Scientists at Nagoya University in Japan have identified the genes that allow an organism to switch between living as single cells and forming multicellular structures. This ability to alternate ...

A study presents a striking example of cooperative organization among cells as a potential force in the evolution of multicellular life. The study is based on the fluid dynamics of cooperative feeding ...

In 2017, researchers discovered Chromosphaera perkinsii, a single-celled organism, in marine sediments in Hawaii. According to scientists from the University of Geneva, this organism can form ...

Learn how one-celled organisms, or single-celled organisms, helped build complex life.

The mystery of how multicellular life evolved has long baffled scientists, who’ve spent years trying to understand how solitary single-celled organisms began living in unison and triggered the ...

Evolved macroscopic "snowflake" yeast from the MuLTEE experiment. The large size of the nuclei (yellow) and cells (cyan) are results of whole-genome duplication and aneuploidy. Sometimes, the most ...

A biochemist, building on the pillars of evolutionary theory and drawing on cutting-edge research into the link between energy and genes, argues that the evolution of multicellular life was the result ...

The evolutionary origin of sperm can be traced back to a single-celled ancestor of all living animals. Almost all animals reproduce by having a single-celled stage of their life cycle, involving two ...