Frogs

Inspired by the toe pads of tree frogs and crickets, researchers in India have created a sticky coating that is strong and reusable. When conventional adhesive tape is pulled off a surface, cracks form on the tape, which also picks up dust and other particles. The researchers reported in the journal Science that tree frogs' toe pads contain "microscopic channel patterns" that stop cracks from forming.

From Costa Rica to Peru, a fungal epidemic fueled by global warming may have wiped out dozens of frog species in otherwise pristine environments, a new study concludes. Within the last 20 years, about two-thirds of Central and South America's 110 brightly colored harlequin frog species have vanished. A killer fungus with a worldwide range and an affinity for amphibian skin previously had been indicted as a prime suspect in their disappearances.

Frogs exposed to a mix of pesticides at extremely low concentrations like those widely found around farms suffer deadly infections, suggesting that the chemicals could be a major culprit in the global disappearance of amphibians, UC Berkeley scientists reported Tuesday. When tadpoles were exposed in laboratory experiments to each pesticide individually, 4% died before they turned into frogs. But when atrazine and eight other pesticides were mixed to replicate a Nebraska cornfield, 35% died.

Of the animal species hit by the firestorm that roared through Southern California in the fall of 2003, the mountain yellow-legged frog was among the most devastated. Already on the endangered list, the yellow-legged population in the San Bernardino Mountains is thought to have been nearly wiped out by the fire, increasing the chances that \o7Rana \f7\o7muscosa\f7 may soon go extinct like so many amphibian species have done.

Efforts to save the mountain yellow-legged frog -- the sweet-croaking amphibian that once roamed Southern California forests but is now on the endangered list -- have suffered a setback. All seven of the tiny frogs that were part of a rescue effort by the San Diego Zoo have died mysteriously, officials announced Tuesday.

BAGGING the "big five" at a game park in South Africa usually means seeing lions, leopards, buffaloes, rhinos and elephants. But for a different breed of animal lover, it's about catching sight of frogs -- the painted reed, banded rubber, Natal sand, foam nest and snoring puddle. To them little is big. The Frog Prince tops the Lion King every time. And nothing could be more delightful than hunting for frogs in the dark on a fetid body of water where crocodiles wallow.

The mountain yellow-legged frog, that marvelous invalid of amphibians, may have yet another chance to avoid extinction. Already imperiled by modernity, the sweet-voiced croaker was devastated by the 2003 forest fires that ravaged its native habitat in Southern California forestland. Then 11 were found near the City Creek area of the San Bernardino Mountains and brought to the San Diego Zoo for a captive-breeding experiment.

The Environmental Protection Agency is focusing on the effect of hazardous waste recycling plants on minorities and low-income communities. The move hearkens back to a Clinton-era executive order that required federal agencies to consider the effect of their policies on disadvantaged communities. Although the Bush administration largely ignored the mandate, Obama-appointed EPA administrator Lisa P. Jackson has promised to analyze those effects.

A frog has been found in a remote part of Indonesia that has no lungs and breathes through its skin, a discovery that researchers this week said could provide insight into what drives evolution in certain species. The aquatic frog Barbourula kalimantanensis was found on Borneo island in 2007, researchers said Thursday in the journal Current Biology. The species is the first frog known to science without lungs and joins a short list of amphibians with this unusual trait, including a few species of salamanders and a wormlike creature known as a caecilian.

Talk about concealed weapons: Harvard University biologists have discovered that some species of African frogs can puncture the skin of their toes with sharp, hooked bones and use them as claws to fight off predators. The previously unknown defense mechanism came to light when doctoral student David C. Blackburn picked up one of the fist-sized amphibians in Cameroon and got a bloody scratch when the frog violently kicked its hind legs. He and colleagues reported in the journal Biology Letters that they later identified 11 species with the ability to flex a muscle that projects the sharp bone through the skin when threatened.