Why are tuna shaped like torpedoes, while reef fish are often tall and flat? Why do some deep-sea fish have enormous eyes, while others have mouths that point sharply upwards or downwards? A study by Victoria Dixon & Isabel Smallegange Originally published on Newcastle University’s From blog The extraordinary diversity of fish body shapes is…
Tag: conservation-biology
DEBBIES wins Open Research Award – and the science it has unlocked
The DEBBIES project has been awarded 2nd place in the Newcastle University Open Research Awards 2025. This recognition means a lot because it is the collective outcome of eight years of student-led research, shared openly and built collaboratively. This blog post celebrates the students whose work built DEBBIES — and highlights the science that their…
How sharks, skates and rays flex their life strategies when food supplies shift
What happens if a shark suddenly finds itself with an abundance of food? Does it grow more rapidly, produce more offspring, or become better equipped to handle environmental stress? These aren’t just intriguing questions; they are vital for conservation efforts. Our recent research reveals that elasmobranchs (the group that includes sharks, skates and rays) don’t…
Behind the paper: The DEBBIES Dataset to study Life Histories across Ectotherms*
A story of how small student projects become more than the sum of their parts in the DEBBIES dataset of ectotherm life history traits. * Smallegange, I.M., Lucas, S. DEBBIES Dataset to study Life Histories across Ectotherms. Sci Data 11, 153 (2024). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41597-024-02986-x It is 2017 and I just got a paper accepted, in which we presented…
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