While the cartoon starfish Patrick Star from "SpongeBob Squarepants" is famously stupid, his real-life counterpart in science may in fact be all head. This at least is the conclusion of a landmark ...

Despite what it looks like, researchers found recently that starfish don’t have limbs that are hugging the surface they touch — the characteristic starfish is actually mostly “just a head.” What did ...

Using genetics-based methods, a multinational team of scientists said in a study published this week in the journal Nature that starfish are all head and no torso. Starfish larvae, like those of most ...

For many creatures, having a limb caught in a predator’s mouth is usually a death sentence. Not starfish, though—they can detach the limb and leave the predator something to chew on while they crawl ...

Time now for our science news roundup from our friends at NPR's Short Wave podcast. Aaron Scott and Regina Barber, welcome back. REGINA BARBER, BYLINE: Hi, Ari. AARON SCOTT, BYLINE: Thank you, Ari.

It sounds like a children's game or an absurd question: Where is the starfish's head? In reality, the enigma has been occupying specialists for over a century, given the unusual structure of the ...

Jaymi Heimbuch is a writer and photographer specializing in wildlife conservation, technology, and food. She is the author of "The Ethiopian Wolf: Hope at the Edge of Extinction." Starfish. Also known ...