When an Australian scientist uncovered an ancient-looking placoderm skull in the 1960s, he thought he'd cracked the code on an evolutionary mystery. This so-called 'platypus fish,' scientists had ...

A comparison of the genomes of the platypus and echidna — Australia’s egg-laying mammals — has revealed new clues about how these monotremes diverged from other mammals. A team that included ...

When British zoologist George Shaw first encountered a platypus specimen in 1799, he was so befuddled that he checked for stitches, thinking someone might be trying to trick him with a Frankencreature ...

If you’ve always thought echidnas and platypuses were distant cousins who went their separate ways on land and water, think again. A single fossilized arm bone, found in a remote corner of ...

When British zoologist George Shaw first encountered a platypus specimen in 1799, he was so befuddled that he checked for stitches, thinking someone might be trying to trick him with a Frankencreature ...

Jars of tiny platypus and echidna specimens, collected in the late 1800s by the scientist William Caldwell, have been discovered in the stores of Cambridge's University Museum of Zoology. Jars of tiny ...

Preface: The loaded word -- Who you callin' an animal? -- Darwin, Darwin, Darwin...! -- The tree [strikethrough] river of life -- Part 1: Outside in -- Part 2: Song of myself -- Part 3: Hopeless ...

The curious discovery of the duck-billed, egg-laying, otter-footed, beaver-tailed, venomous platypus in Australia in 1798 convinced British scientists that it must be a hoax. Sketches of its ...

With a beaver’s tail, webbed feet, and a duck’s bill, platypuses are one of the world’s strangest-looking creatures. They are such an unusual mammal that the first scientists to study them believed ...