Newly Discovered Prehistoric Armored Dinosaur May Have Been Able to Dig
Newly excavated skeletal remains of an ankylosaurid — a large armored herbivore that lived during the Cretaceous Period — may indicate that members of this…
Evolution
New Fossil Discovery of a Distinct, Ancient Human Species Points to Complicated Evolutionary Process
Analysis of recently discovered fossils found in Israel suggests that interactions between different human species were more complex than previously believed, according to a team…
New Research Shows Dinosaurs Were in Decline for Million Years Before the Final Asteroid Death Blow
The death of the dinosaurs 66 million years ago was caused by the impact of a huge asteroid on the Earth. However, paleontologists have continued…
Tiny Ancient Bird Discovered in China Shares Skull Features With Tyrannosaurus rex
Researchers from the Institute of Vertebrate Paleontology and Paleoanthropology (IVPP) of the Chinese Academy of Sciences have discovered a 120-million-year-old partial fossil skeleton of a…
When T. rex Dominated, Medium-Sized Predators Disappeared – Replaced by Juvenile Tyrannosaurs
New University of Maryland study suggests that everywhere tyrannosaurs rose to dominance, their juveniles took over the ecological role of medium-sized carnivores. A new study…
Purging Bad Mutations: Males Help Keep Populations Genetically Healthy
A few males are enough to fertilize all the females. The number of males, therefore, has little bearing on a population’s growth. However, they are…
Newly Discovered Human Species “Dragon Man” May Replace Neanderthals As Our Closest Relative
A near-perfectly preserved ancient human fossil known as the Harbin cranium sits in the Geoscience Museum in Hebei GEO University. The largest of known Homo skulls, scientists…
Archaeologists Make Dramatic Discovery: A Prehistoric Human Type Previously Unknown to Science
Dramatic Discovery in Israeli Excavation The discovery of a new Homo group in this region, which resembles Pre-Neanderthal populations in Europe, challenges the prevailing hypothesis…
Strange Biology: The Very Venomous Caterpillar
The venom of a caterpillar, native to South East Queensland, shows promise for use in medicines and pest control, Institute for Molecular Bioscience researchers say….
Coping With Extremes: How the One-Humped Arabian Camel Survives Without Drinking
Research led by scientists at the University of Bristol has shed new light on how the kidneys of the one-humped Arabian camel play an important…
A Fair Society Evolves From “Veil of Ignorance” – Mongooses Solve Inequality Problem
A fair society has evolved in banded mongooses because parents don’t know which pups are their own, new research shows. Mothers in banded mongoose groups…
Smelling in Stereo: The Real Reason Snakes Have Flicking, Forked Tongues
As dinosaurs lumbered through the humid cycad forests of ancient South America 180 million years ago, primeval lizards scurried, unnoticed, beneath their feet. Perhaps to…
Sperm Evolution Becomes Supercharged Only When They Swim Inside Females
Sperm size varies dramatically among different animal species. But why is sperm size so variable when they share the same job — to fertilize eggs?…
Smaller Bodies, Longer Wings, Earlier Migrations: Untangling the Multiple Impacts of Climate Warming on Birds
When a University of Michigan-led research team reported last year that North American migratory birds have been getting smaller over the past four decades and…
Complementary Cognition: The Evolution of Collective Intelligence
The period preceding the emergence of behaviorally modern humans was characterized by dramatic climatic and environmental variability – it is these pressures, occurring over hundreds…
Unearthing Neanderthal Population History Using Ancient Nuclear DNA From Cave Sediments
Mitochondrial DNA of archaic humans has been retrieved from cave sediments, but it has limited value for studying population relationships. Now, researchers present a method…
Scientists Discover a New Genetic Mutation That Distinguishes Modern Humans From Neanderthals
Skoltech scientists and their colleagues from Germany and the United States have analyzed the metabolomes of humans, chimpanzees, and macaques in muscle, kidney, and three…
New Species of Giant Rhino – the Largest Land Mammal That Ever Lived – Offers Clues to a Long-Running Mystery
The giant rhino, Paraceratherium, is considered the largest land mammal that ever lived and was mainly found in Asia, especially China, Mongolia, Kazakhstan, and Pakistan. How…