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The Cambridge Animal Alphabet series celebrates Cambridge's connections with animals through literature, art, science and society. Here, J is for Jay – a surprisingly clever corvid with the ability to mimic human voices and much more. Jays are corvids – members of the crow family. The jays we see in Britain are Eurasian jays. With their pinkish plumage, and characteristic flash of blue, they

From Albatross to Zebrafish, the Cambridge Animal Alphabet series celebrates Cambridge’s connections with animals through literature, art, science and society. The articles are now being made available as a series of podcasts, and in our new publication on Medium. https://medium.com/cambridge-animal-alphabet

Content warning: this film contains images of blood and surgery For people with organ failure, transplantation is the only option. A lack of suitable organs for transplantation means patients die every day. Researchers in the University’s Department of Surgery are using large animal models to understand why donated organs become damaged and unsuitable for transplantation, and to test promising

Howler monkeys are about the size of a small dog, weighing around seven kilos, yet they are among the loudest terrestrial animals on the planet, and can roar at a similar acoustic frequency to tigers. Evolution has given these otherwise lethargic creatures a complex and powerful vocal system. For males, a critical function of the roar is for mating: to attract females and scare off rival males.

In Kenya, Dr Lauren Evans, a post-doctoral researcher at the Department of Geography, is also researching the conflicts that arise when elephants and humans share the same rural landscape. She is an associate director of Space for Giants, a Kenyan-based elephant conservation charity that seeks to ensure a future for elephants through human-elephant conflict mitigation, anti-poaching, securing

Give and Take explores the complex nature of gift giving for humans and their close animal relatives. The film brings biology, psychology, political studies, philosophy and theology into dialogue. Interviewees include Cambridge’s Professor Claire Hughes (Psychology), Professor Nicky Clayton (Psychology) and Dr Andrew Davison (Theology and Natural Sciences). Giving figures prominently in many

Entomics Biosystems, a company set up by a group of Cambridge students, is developing a sustainable feed of the future – based on maggots and food waste.

Professor Sir John Sulston (University of Manchester, UK) Abstract: Darwin liberated us from dogma by making biology comprehensible, so allowing us to move forward. But whilst natural selection provides an explanation for our existence, it does not tell us how to behave. We must ourselves face up to our future as a thinking and powerful animal.

COVID-19 is caused by a virus that jumped from animals to humans - and then spread rapidly. The risk of this happening again, causing another pandemic, is very real. Cambridge researchers have looked at all the major ways this might happen, to work out what might be done to reduce the risk. Read more here:

An experiment on coral reefs provides the first evidence of a fish that uses other animals for motion camouflage to approach prey without detection. Coral reefs around the world are being degraded due to the warming climate, pollution and overfishing. The researchers say the strategy of hiding behind other moving fish may help animals adapt to the impacts of environmental change. Researchers: Dr