240 Million-Year-Old Marine Predator Species With Fang-Like Teeth Uncovered in China
About 240 million years ago, when reptiles ruled the ocean, a small lizard-like predator floated near the bottom of the edges in shallow water, picking…
Archaeology
Clovis People: Tools Made by Some of North America’s Earliest Inhabitants Were Made Only During a 300-Year Period
New Clues Revealed About Clovis People A study by professor Michael Waters shows that tools made by some of North America’s earliest inhabitants were made…
Defining Moment in Human Evolution: Turbulent Era Sparked Leap in Human Behavior, Technology 320,000 Years Ago
New drill core shows a boom-bust landscape in the east African rift valley at a defining moment in human evolution, technology and culture. For hundreds…
Closely Guarded Secret Technology: 6,500-Year-Old Copper Workshop Uncovered in the Negev Desert
Tel Aviv University and Israel Antiquities Authority believe copper-producing technology was closely guarded secret. A new study by Tel Aviv University and the Israel Antiquities…
New Biochemical Research Shows Past Tropical Forest Changes Drove Megafauna and Hominin Extinctions
New biochemical research shows significant turnovers in Southeast Asian environments and animals during the Pleistocene. In a paper published today in the journal Nature, scientists from…
New Evidence That an Ancient Earthquake Caused the Destruction of Canaanite Palace at Tel Kabri
Flourishing Canaanite palatial site suddenly abandoned 3,700 years ago; new evidence points to earthquake as probable culprit. A team of Israeli and American researchers funded…
48,000 Year-Old Baby Tooth Found – Belonged to One of the Last Neanderthals in Northern Italy
A milk-tooth (i.e. baby tooth) found in the vicinity of “Riparo del Broion” on the Berici Hills in the Veneto region bears evidence of one…
World’s Largest DNA Analysis of Viking Skeletons Yields Unexpected Results About Who They Really Were
In the popular imagination, Vikings were fearsome blonde-haired warriors from Scandinavia who used longboats to carry out raids across Europe in a brief but bloody…
Dinosaur Feather Study Debunked: Overwhelming Evidence Supports Jurassic Fossil Belongs to Archaeopteryx
A new study provides substantial evidence that the first fossil feather ever to be discovered does belong to the iconic Archaeopteryx, a bird-like dinosaur named…
Naked Prehistoric Monsters! Pterosaurs, Ancient Flying Reptiles, May Not Have Had Feathers at All
The debate about when dinosaurs developed feathers has taken a new turn with a paper refuting earlier claims that feathers were also found on dinosaurs’…
Neanderthal and Denisovan Y Chromosomes Sequenced – Surprise When Compared to Modern Human DNA
Neanderthals have adopted male sex chromosome from modern humans. In 1997, the very first Neanderthal DNA sequence — just a small part of the mitochondrial…
Sexual Intercourse of Ostracods Revealed Through 100-Million-Year-Old Amber Discovery
Small bivalved crustacean ostracods are the most abundant fossil arthropods since the Ordovician and play an important role in paleoenvironmental reconstruction and evolutionary biology. The…
Our Early Ancestors May Have Boiled Their Food in Hot Springs Long Before Learning to Control Fire
Scientists have found evidence of hot springs near sites where ancient hominids settled, long before the control of fire. Some of the oldest remains of…
Giant 100 Million Year Old Sperm Cells Discovered – The Oldest Known Sperm Cells
In another fascinating snapshot from deep time, an international team of paleontologists has reported the discovery of specimens of a minuscule crustacean that dates back…
Reconstructing the Meals That People Consumed in the Past From Chemical Residues on Ancient Cooking Pots
Archaeologists find that unglazed ceramic cookware absorbs the chemical residue of present and past meals. If you happen to dig up an ancient ceramic cooking…
New Dating of Nebra Sky Disk Makes All Previous Astronomical Interpretations Obsolete
Archaeologists from Frankfurt and Munich prove origins in the first millennium B.C. Until now the Nebra sky disk was deemed to be from the Early…
Lactose Tolerance Quickly Spread Throughout Europe – Genetic Analysis of Human Bones From Bronze Age Battlefield Reveals
Paleogeneticists at Mainz University have found evidence of lactase persistence in only a small proportion of human bones from the Bronze Age battlefield in the…
How Climate Change Led to the Fall of an Ancient Civilization
Chaos paper by RIT Assistant Professor Nishant Malik applies method to Indus Valley Civilization. A Rochester Institute of Technology researcher developed a mathematical method that…