There’s a reason fashion designers look to animal prints for inspiration. Creatures have evolved a dizzying array of patterns: stripes, spots, diamonds, chevrons, hexagons and even mazelike designs.

There are many purposes that spots and stripes serve in nature, but how they form has been more of a mystery to scientists. Now, researchers have advanced their breakthrough theory – and it could help ...

More than 70 years ago, mathematician Alan Turing proposed a mechanism that explained how patterns could emerge from bland uniformity. Scientists are still using his model—and adding new twists—to ...

From tiger stripes to leopard spots, the animal world is full of distinctive and intricate patterns. In a new study, CU Boulder scientists refined their previous theory of how animal patterns form and ...

Many animals get their external marking—like, feathers, hair or scales-from genetics. But it turns out, the crocodile gets its head patterns differently. Scientists normally explain the spectacular ...

Nature follows mathematical rules and creates repeating patterns across completely different organisms and environments.

Scientists normally explain the spectacular diversity of animal patterns by pointing to genetics. But a study in Nature suggests that, at least for crocodile heads, different forces might be at play.