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China announces a ban on all ivory trade and processing activities by the end of 2017.

Here's a selection of the most inspiring findings in archaeology revealed this year.

Migrating birds are arriving at their breeding grounds earlier as global temperatures rise, an Edinburgh University study finds.

A rare giraffe has been born at Chester Zoo.

Warm winters and bad summers have hit the insect population, but seen other wildlife flourish, says the National Trust

Urgent action is needed to stop the cheetah - the world's fastest land animal - becoming extinct, scientists say.

A selection of the best science and environment reads this year.

Astronomer Vera Rubin, whose pioneering work led to the theory of dark matter, dies at 88.

A new study estimates there are just 7,100 now left in the wild as the wide-ranging mammal faces growing conflict with humans.

UK scientists have decoded the genome of the ash in the fight against a devastating plant disease.

A selection of the best science and environment reads this year.

Could wave energy ever power the world?

A UK designer launches the "30-year Christmas sweatshirt" to question the ethics of the "fast fashion" industry.

Temperatures at the North Pole could be up to 20 degrees higher than average this Christmas Eve.

British-born astronaut Piers Sellers has died of pancreatic cancer, aged 61, Nasa says.

A British team is in the final stages of designing its car for next year's World Solar Challenge in the Australian desert.

Some dinosaurs shed their teeth as they grew up, according to fossil evidence.

For the first time scientists have been able to track the high-flying insects that migrate across the skies of Southern England every year.

Two baby orangutans have been rescued from the back of a taxi in Thailand.

Threatened by habitat loss and hunting, Madagascar's lemurs, a critically endangered species, are finding refuge in a private sanctuary.