Humans news stories

Along a stream in Tajikistan, archaeologists have discovered a rock-shelter that may have been a migration site for Neanderthals, Denisovans and modern humans over a span of 130,000 years. See the study here.

Scientists believe individuals of the most recently discovered hominin group (the Denisovans) that interbred with modern day humans passed on some of their genes via multiple, distinct interbreeding events that helped shape early human history. The paper was published in Nature Genetics.

An enigmatic stone and turf structure on Bodmin Moor that was previously thought to be a medieval animal pen has been found to be 4,000 years older – and unique in Europe.

The Ice Age campsite of Gönnersdorf on the banks of the Rhine has revealed a groundbreaking discovery that sheds new light on early fishing practices. The work is published in the journal PLOS ONE.

Ai-Da’s works were “ethereal and haunting” and “continue to question where the power of AI will take us, and the global race to harness its power”…

Ancient DNA taken from the Pompeii victims of Mount Vesuvius’ eruption nearly 2,000 years ago reveals that some people’s relationships were not what they seemed, according to a new study…”These findings challenge traditional gender and familial assumptions.”

Combining these Indigenous accounts with other sources of research has led them to conclude that the art speaks of ritual specialists negotiating spiritual realms, the transformation of bodies, and the intertwining of human and non-human worlds—rather than a more literal record of the environment they lived in and the species they encountered.

In a study, “Late Pleistocene exploitation of Ephedra in a funerary context in Morocco,” published in Scientific Reports, researchers detail their findings in an excavation of a cave occupied by modern humans for over 100,000 years.

A skeleton buried in a fetal position is actually made of bones from at least five people who lived across a span of 2,500 years…A study published Oct. 23 in the journal Antiquity… sheds light on the meaning of the composite burial via multiple techniques, including skeletal analysis, radiocarbon dating and ancient-DNA sequencing.

Voters in Massachusetts rejected Question 4, a ballot initiative that would have decriminalized plant-based psychedelics for residents and green-lit a state-regulated psychedelic-assisted therapy system.

A recent study published in the Journal of Affective Disorders suggests that a single dose of psilocybin may offer hope for U.S. military veterans facing severe, treatment-resistant depression.

A recent preliminary study by Ph.D. student Leonie Hoff of the University of Oxford, published in the Oxford Journal of Archaeology, provides insight into how ancient fingerprints left on terracotta figurines reveal the age and sex of their makers.

According to the researchers, several symbols engraved on stone “cylinder seals” were developed into signs used in “proto-cuneiform,” an early version of the cuneiform script used in southern Mesopotamia, now southern Iraq. The researchers reported their findings in a study published Tuesday (Nov. 5) in the journal Antiquity.

A recent study published in AJOB Neuroscience found that a majority of Americans support psilocybin, a psychedelic compound from certain mushrooms, for supervised medical treatment and well-being enhancement. This strong bipartisan approval highlights public openness to legalized and controlled use of the drug for both medical and personal enhancement purposes, though with caution for future policy.

Scientists say there has been an alarming lack of progress in saving nature as the UN biodiversity summit, COP 16, draws to a close…Representatives of 196 countries have been meeting in Cali, Colombia, to agree on how to halt nature decline by 2030.

The region is known as one of the earliest places people practiced animal husbandry. The new study adds insight into how this developed. The study, published in Nature, spans nearly 6,000 years of genetic data in the region.