Environment

'Amazing extremes' pushing plants to the brink

THE BIG PICTURE
Eventually, the drought can become a burden too great. This home near Ivanhoe was abandoned to the dust ...

Australia's inland plants are among those most likely to be affected by rising temperatures, challenging the concept that the country's weather extremes would make them less susceptible to global warming, a new study has found.

The rise of the super-typhoon

Eye of the storm: Super Typhoon Soudelor bears  down on Taiwan in 2015.

The most destructive categories of tropical storms to strike the heavily populated regions of east Asia are becoming more intense.

Fish pretend it's night to tackle hot seas

The spiny damselfish produces offspring with flexible body clocks that help adapt to ocean acidification.

Some fish may cope with the changing chemistry of the oceans linked to global warming by permanently setting their body defences to night-time levels, the time of day when they find seawater least hospitable, a study says.