Posts tagged biology
I'm trying to design human like race where all the children are born as girls, but later in life some of them switch to male, but no sooner then 15. Usually only the most dominant women switch, so ...
So I'm pretty sure your are all aware of what a cell is the microscopic organic units that make up all life. Well they don't have to be microscopic. An unfertilized chicken egg is a single cell. ...
A short time ago I read that life might be possible on interstellar planets (i.e. planet-like objects which aren't bound to a star by gravity.) They may be insanely cold on the surface but inside t...
I have a world that has unexpected lifeforms detected. There are to-be-revealed reasons for it, but the way the ecosystem is set up is: Microbial life is abundant everywhere There is a single sp...
As anyone who has watched the Jurassic Park series knows, Hollywood likes to exaggerate a bit when it comes to dinosaurs and their scientific accuracy. Many facts are fairly easy to prove right or ...
Space nets are a theoretical space organism designed by Tim B, to quote him: Imagine a life-form shaped like a giant net. It gathers space dust into itself to grow, using light from stars bot...
I'm developing a world in the near future where a start-up company develops an artificial womb. Now well-off people could grow their children from their eggs & sperm. My story is about couples ...
Would it be possible for a virus to extend the average human life-span (but only by about 50-70 years max) if the infected people kept it controlled enough where it wouldn't (alternatively) kill th...
There is a nocturnal mammal, about the size of a common red fox, which has evolved (by way of some unspecified-at-this-point selective pressure) the ability to see well in situations involving larg...
I'm writing a sci-fi screenplay and I wonder how a human face of an adolescent would look if it was somehow covered with a sort of flexible mask since birth? What would you discover if you removed ...
Partly due to WB's great response to my steampunk questions, I think the world I'll work on next will have to be steampunk :) If I had a steampunk cyborg running around, what could he do with his ...
Slenderman is unarguably the most iconic creation of the early internet. It has led to games, stories and even books. But is his design evolutionarily possible? What evolutionary pressures would le...
The Problem In a world I am building, the days are 9 years long, this means 4 and half years of cold darkness following 4 and a half years of blistering daylight. I have asked questions on this Ye...
I'm imagining an electromagnetic wave that could deliberately alter its wavelength. It would be a totally unfamiliar type of creature, but actually, we material beings act because of the electical ...
I've always liked living spaceships, but it seems to me that the animal kingdom would make far inferior spaceships to the plant kingdom. With that in mind, what does this tree-ship have to be made ...
My hero is a synthetic biologist of an ancient race that achieved spaceflight billions years ago. His bio ship could achieve high fraction of speed of light, and he could repair or modify his body ...
There was a good question and answer here: Does mermaid evolution come with buoyancy control? But I would like to expand the question. I got off talking with a friend, it got me thinking about mer...
I was wondering whether a planet might exist that has life forms with up to five sexes, with a single organism having three different and independent, functional sets of sexual organs. Presuming in...
In the marvel universe mutants are much more fortunate than in our world; they often have extremely useful powers; ranging from telekinetic abilities to wings. As interesting and plain fun as this...
Had a random thought. I was wondering if a uranium deposits underwater could result in radiotrophic plants or bacteria to sustain an ecosystem. One issue with this, is radiation has very short att...
A common problem I have with modern science fiction and fantasy (Halo, Mass Effect, Narnia etc) is that the aliens and animals are somehow able to speak in perfect human speech. How does an alien o...
Since I'm getting plenty of great for my other question "How can a nine tailed fox catch its prey? Thought I might try to get ideas for both fox-fire and illusions. So far I've thought of biolumin...
I'm designing a city built to take advantage of valuable mineral deposits in a large polar desert. The city is built around a Yellowstone-esque region of hot springs and geysers, where underground ...
I'll keep this one brief. I have an alien from a planet which has extremely cold nights and extremely hot days (the day and night cycle may be short or long, I haven't decided). When the alien get...
I'm looking for biological explanations for some traits I want to give to an alien creature. Description of the Creature It looks like a five foot tall praying mantis, or perhaps a centaur. It ha...
What are the effects of introducing 2600 sharks of the primitive Edestus Gigantus specie* in modern waters in different places on earth? Will they survive, how ? for how long? can they destroy the...
In lots of science fiction works that visit other planets we are often introduced to intelligent plant based lifeforms, be they humanoid looking or potted plant looking. I'm curious as to what par...
All organisms on Earth produce waste. Whether an organism's respiration has a byproduct, or it just doesn't process all food it consumes, it will always put some amount of matter into the environme...
They say that nature abhors a vacuum, but could life evolve to live in one? Alternately, could life be engineered to exist on a planet with no atmosphere, even if there is no biologically feasible ...
I'm working at a story about the future of life in our Solar System. Humans have gone millions of years ago, but they left behind them a group of highly intelligent but not superhuman AIs with the...
I was wondering, how would a civilization of humans who can see only in grayscale live their life? There is none of them that can see color. Everyone sees every thing in gray. Yet, color actually d...
I have an earth like planet where stalkers live. They are: Humanoid about same height, strength & speed as humans Three pairs of eyes placed horizontally (Near UV, Visible, Near IR) Lightspee...
To be clear, I'm not talking about AB, O, A, or B type blood. I'm not talking about different colored blood, either; I saw a bunch of those types of questions earlier. I'm talking about anoxygeni...
In the world I'm making I want to have very large creatures that will later be used in organic architecture as housing for the human equivalent in this world. In order to make this world realistic ...
I would like to have a humanoids with three pairs of eyes placed on the same horizontal plane like in Protheans not one below the other like Batarian. I was thinking of one pair being sensitive to...
You know Dasher and Dancer and Prancer and Vixen, Comet and Cupid and Donner and Blitzen. But how will nature give Santa's reindeer the best justification of all? Flight is the first and most obv...
I want to create an alien life for a planet which is at about 6"“8 Earth masses. It has a thick atmosphere made of hydrogen, helium, methane and nitrogen. I want that life to evolve slowly and be q...
Silicon is often brought up in science fiction as being very similar to carbon, just below it on the periodic table. The silicon-based "organic" molecules are more tightly bound and thus would fin...
If you were to hook up a human being to a sort of syringe sized water wheel to generate power using the force of their blood flow; how much power could they generate? Consider a human in a medical...
Implants and/or augmentations in human brain are widely shown in fiction: improving and/or enhancing certain functions of the brain by artificial means can have nearly endless possibilities. All o...
In a million years or so, descendants of humans (intelligence comparable to wolves) are driven into caves due to competition with land and resources from descendants from alligators and crocodiles....
Some information about their homeworld: Their homeworld, 0.34247 (M⊕) 0.54 G, 10156 km. The atmospheric pressure of their homeworld is 62% of the Earth's, and the planet has an average temper...
In a world inhabited by small grassland herbivores, night-time is a very scary time indeed. With no moon or other substantial light-source to illuminate the plains, they are in great danger of beco...
Aside from resorting to a grey goo-ish nanoplague that kills indiscriminately regardless of biochemistry, how might an alien virus, bacteria or other pathogen still be dangerous to humans? Could a ...
I was trying to put together an idea for a Gas Giant like planet that could possibly support some kind of fairly complex life, and I hit upon a few ideas: -Located in a habitable zone roughly simi...
A superhuman character in my book has the ability to sense objects outside of his body by simply being around them without touching them. There is some sort of field that extends outside of his bod...
For all who are unaware, synesthesia is a condition in the brain where two or more senses are connected; for example being able to see sound or hear color. Of course they do not actually see color ...
I'm designing creatures with naturally occurring white or pale grey irises and pupils so that it looks like their eyes are all white. What effect could this have their vision (colorblindness, light...
Disclaimer: This question is the third of a new series of questions of mine about introducing hexapeds to the fauna of my conworld. There are/will be other questions addressing i.a.: characteristic...
Suppose the Wicked Witch of the West was simply an alien life form that was stranded in Oz. She comes from a race of beings that are water soluble. She would have to be able to resist a small a...
