Marine Life

Up to 90% of deep-sea animals produce light, and it's evolved independently at least 40 times. Here's the chemistry behind the glow, and why dinoflagellates flash when you disturb them.

Some whales can hold a single breath for nearly 4 hours. Here's how myoglobin, bradycardia, and collapsing lungs make it possible, and why the trick doesn't work for scuba divers.

Divers make up under 5% of unprovoked shark bites despite spending the most time near sharks. Here's what the actual data shows, and why sharks rarely see divers as prey.

Octopuses colour-match reefs in under a tenth of a second, despite being colourblind. Here's how chromatophores, iridophores, and light-sensing skin make it happen.

Fish do get decompression sickness, just from a completely different mechanism than divers. Here's why gills change the physics, and what a swim bladder has to do with it.