Location of the Buran Kaya III (1), Zlatý Kůň (2), Fournol (3), Serinyà (4), Krems-Wachtberg (5) and Věstonice (6) archeological sites, whose remains were were analysed in the study. Also shown are one of the analysed skull fragments and pierced beads discovered with the bone fragments from the Buran Kaya III site, as well as the Venus statuettes from Věstonice, Willendorf and the Dame de Brassempouy (from right to left).
E-M. Geigl
Genetic analysis of two skull fragments dating back almost 40,000 years shows that our species colonised Europe from the east and interbred with our Neanderthal cousins.
What happened to the Neanderthals?
frantic00 via Shutterstock.com
A general view of Wadi Gharandal riverine wetland, along the Jordan Rift Valley, showing palm trees concentrated at the centre of the wadi near the active spring.
Mahmoud Abbas
Homo naledi had a brain less than half the size of our own. Yet the new research claims it had cognitive abilities far beyond what we might expect.
The oldest known footprint of our species, lightly ringed with chalk. It appears long and narrow because the trackmaker dragged their heel.
Charles Helm
Brian Anthony Keeling, Binghamton University, State University of New York and Rolf Quam, Binghamton University, State University of New York
Scientists had figured a fossil found in Spain more than a century ago was from a Neandertal. But a new analysis suggests it could be from a lost lineage of our species, Homo sapiens.
This whirlwind tour of social history describes how infectious diseases have shaped humanity at every stage. It suggests reducing inequality will give us our best chance of surviving future plagues.
To test the ballistic properties of the stone points found in the Mandrin cave, modern duplicates were created and hafted on to shafts, as they may have been 54,000 years ago.
Laure Metz, Ludovic Slimak
Laure Metz, Aix-Marseille Université (AMU); Jason E. Lewis, Stony Brook University (The State University of New York), and Ludovic Slimak, Université Toulouse – Jean Jaurès
In 2022 we detailed the discovery of 1,500 stone points in France’s Madrin cave. Experiments now show that they could were used as arrowheads, pushing back evidence of archery in Eurasia by 40,000 years.
3D rendering of the tiktaalik, an extinct walking fish.
Dotted Yeti/Shutterstock
We can trace our human evolutionary lineage back to fish.
Any hominid fossil find with molar teeth can be plugged into a new equation that reveals its species’ prenatal growth rate.
Gil Cohen-Magen/AFP via Getty Images
Using a new equation based on today’s primates, scientists can take a few molar teeth from an extinct fossil species and reconstruct exactly how fast their offspring grew during gestation.
Humans have used technology to adapt to the cold.
Yvette Cardozo / Alamy Stock Photo
Humanity carries traces of other populations in our DNA – and a new study shows how one of these ancestors has influenced the immune systems of modern Papuans.