Modern humans and Neanderthals share a tangled genetic history
Our ancestors interbred with Neanderthals at multiple times.
In recent years, scientists have uncovered evidence that Neanderthals and modern humans interbred.
Previous research has shown that...
Nuclear bomb tests help determine age of largest fish on Earth
Nuclear bomb tests during the Cold War in the 1950s and 1960s have helped scientists accurately estimate the age of whale sharks, the biggest...
Scientists discover four new pterosaurs in matter of weeks
You wait ages for a pterosaur and then four come along at once.
Hot on the heels of a recent paper discovering three new species...
90-million-year-old rainforest in Antarctica reveals a different prehistoric world
Researchers have found evidence of rainforests near the South Pole 90 million years ago, suggesting the climate was exceptionally warm at the time.
A team...
Scientists get first look at cause of ‘slow motion’ earthquakes
An international team of scientists has for the first time identified the conditions deep below the Earth's surface that lead to the triggering of...
In Earth’s largest extinction, land die-offs began long before ocean turnover
The mass extinction at the end of the Permian Peri od 252 million years ago -- one of the great turnovers of life on...
This feathered dinosaur was one of the last surviving raptors
A new feathered dinosaur that lived in New Mexico 67 million years ago is one of the last known surviving raptor species, according to...
Scientists discover new species of flying pterosaurs
A community of flying reptiles that inhabited the Sahara 100 million years ago has been discovered by a University of Portsmouth palaeontologist and an...
Scientists discover the ancestor of all animals in fossils
A team led by UC Riverside geologists has discovered the first ancestor on the family tree that contains most familiar animals today, including humans.
The...
Darkness, not cold, likely responsible for dinosaur-killing extinction
Roughly 66 million years ago an asteroid slammed into the Yucatan peninsula.
New research shows darkness, not cold, likely drove a mass extinction after...