How does human activity impact the creatures we currently share the planet with? A new study has found that mammals across the globe are increasingly turning nocturnal, in a bid to avoid contact with us pesky humans.
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Aarchaeologists excavating a new site in Pompeii have uncovered a new victim of the disaster, who has quite a story to tell. The skeleton was found with its head crushed beneath a huge stone block that was thrown by the force of the volcanic cloud.
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Using a new microscopic technique scientists have identified a previously unknown human anatomical feature. Dubbed the interstitium, the discovery reveals that what was previously thought to be simply dense connective tissue is actually a complex series of interconnected, fluid-filled compartments.
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The origin story for modern humans basically goes that Homo Sapiens first arose several hundred thousand years ago in Ethiopia, before migrating out of Africa about 100,000 years ago. Now, a jawbone discovered in a cave in Israel pushes back the date of our African exodus by at least 50,000 years.
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If humans are ever going to colonize Mars, we need to make sure we can grow food locally. Now a team from Wageningen University & Research has found that earthworms might soon need a name change: these creatures crucial for making soil fertile, can thrive and reproduce in simulated Martian soil.
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Previous studies seemed to tell the tale of the last population of Neanderthals huddled in a Croatian cave 32,000 years ago as modern humans invaded Europe. But an Oxford team has analyzed bones using a new radiocarbon dating technique and found the Neanderthal remains were too old to fit the story.
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Researchers have found human-like footprints dating back 5.7 million years – a time when our ancestors were thought to still be getting around on ape-like feet. More mysteriously, these prints were found in the Greek islands, implying hominins left Africa much earlier than previously thought.
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Switching to farming from hunting left an indelible mark on our biology, as the softer foods meant we didn’t need to spend so much energy chewing. Studying hundreds of pre-industrial era human skulls, new research has singled out the foodstuff with the biggest impact on our skull shape: cheese.
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A dizzying number of microbes call the human body home, and it turns out that science knows very little about most of them.
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A discovery has revealed the genetic trace of a mysterious, and possibly undiscovered, ancient sub-species of human present in the modern-day genome of Sub-Saharan Africans. This discovery also indicates that interbreeding between ancient human species was more widespread than previously thought.
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