A lot of things, actually! I went for a short hike on Thursday and was struck by the diversity of white and filamentous structures in the forest. Filamentous – long strands are a common biological theme, because they join parts together or transport resources. White – many low atomic number materials (like nearly all biological…

I especially like insects because of their incredible diversity in bodies. Imagine all of the potential body shapes that could be achieved on a segmented, six-legged frame – flying, walking, burrowing, small, large… nearly all of it has been tried by some species. An interesting evolutionary question is to ask why some parts of this…