The nonprofit Center for Biological Diversity filed suit in federal court last week calling on the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to designate coastal waters off southwest Alaska as critical habitat for dwindling numbers of sea otters. If the court sides with environmentalists, the federal government would have to limit or ban oil drilling and other industrial activities in the area that could harm the long-term survival of the marine mammals, which were listed as threatened under the Endangered Species Act in 2005 following declines of up to 90 percent.

A new report by the international nonprofit WWF details how scientists have uncovered dozens of species of plants and animals formerly unknown to science in the jungles and coastal waters of the Indonesian island of Borneo. Scientists working under the auspices of WWF’s Heart of Borneo program report discovering 30 unique fish species, two tree frog species, 16 ginger species, three tree species and one large-leafed plant species.