The authors found that b etween 500,000 and 1 million plant and animals species face extinction, many within decades. The report reiterates that there's just one factor to blame for this troubling ...

In the case of mammals, the best-studied group of animals, the fossil record indicates that the “background” rate of extinction, the one that prevailed before humans entered the picture, is so ...

There’s no way to sugarcoat it: Animal and plant life is declining across the globe at rates never seen before in human history. And alongside this decline, extinction rates are speeding up — as many ...

The IUCN has assessed the extinction risk of only about 5% of the world's known species, so there must be many more ...

If so, it may be the fastest one ever with a rate of 1,000 to 10,000 times the baseline extinction rate of one to five species per year. Humans are largely responsible for the striking trend.

The background level of extinction known from the fossil record is about one species per million species per year, or between 10 and 100 species per year (counting all organisms such as insects ...

Every Taxon Is in Trouble. AMPHIBIANS No group of animals has a higher rate of endangerment than amphibians. Scientists estimate that a third or more of all the roughly 6,300 known species of ...

Harvard biologist E. O. Wilson estimated that 30,000 species per year (or three species per hour) are being driven to extinction. Compare this to the natural background rate of one extinction per ...

At least five times, a biological catastrophe has engulfed Earth killing off the vast majority of species. As scientists say we’re in a sixth mass extinction, what can we learn from the past?

At least five times, a biological catastrophe has engulfed Earth killing off the vast majority of species. As scientists say we’re in a sixth mass extinction, what can we learn from the past?

It could be, he says, that island species with a slower metabolism are actually at a lower risk of extinction than the authors found—or at an even higher one. Rights & Permissions Rachel Nuwer ...