A pale body half-submerged in dark water, eyelids slack, body motionless. Visitors tended to arrive at “the Swamp”—a live ...

SAN FRANCISCO, CA (December 16, 2025) — Researchers at the California Academy of Sciences recently traveled to Guam to retrieve valuable data collected over nearly a decade in deep coral reefs (>330 ...

SAN FRANCISCO, CA (January 7, 2026) — Researchers at the California Academy of Sciences described 72 new animal, plant, and fungi species in 2025, enriching scientists’ understanding of Earth’s ...

SAN FRANCISCO, CA (December 2, 2025) — It is with a heavy heart that we share the news that Claude, our beloved albino alligator, has passed away at the age of 30. Claude was an iconic California ...

Says lead author Camilo Mora of the University of Hawaii and Dalhousie University in Halifax, Canada: “The question of how many species exist has intrigued scientists for centuries and the answer, ...

SAN FRANCISCO, CA (August 11, 2025) — The California Academy of Sciences is gearing up to celebrate one of our most iconic residents: Claude, the beloved albino alligator, who turns 30 on September 15 ...

McGuire and his Berkeley colleague, Robert Dudley, published a paper last week on the extreme evolution of hummingbirds. It’s an amazing tale that takes the small birds from one continent to another ...

SAN FRANCISCO, CA (February 25, 2025) — A new study of coyote movement patterns published today in Ecology Letters challenges previous research that suggests ecological landscape features—like the ...

SAN FRANCISCO, CA (February 18, 2025) — Academy researchers and partners made the first discovery of both a new genus and species of plant in a U.S. national park in nearly 50 years. The ...

This new grant expands upon existing Moore Foundation funding that helped Academy researchers initiate a massive digitization project focused on California plant specimens. Academy scientists will now ...

SAN FRANCISCO, CA (December 19, 2024) — Researchers at the California Academy of Sciences described 138 new animal, plant, and fungi species in 2024, enriching our understanding of Earth’s ...

“The Forest Of The Monarchs,” a photo of the Monarch Butterfly Biosphere Reserve in Michoacán, Mexico, taken by National Geographic Explorer Jaime Rojo won the 2024 BigPicture Grand Prize.