Humans news stories

In a new study, researchers take a closer look at this transformative era through the lens of Murayghat, an ancient archaeological site located near the city of Madaba in what is now Jordan. The study was published in Levant: The Journal of the Council for British Research in the Levant.

The ability to make art has often been considered a hallmark of our species. Over a century ago, prehistorians even had trouble believing that modern humans from the Upper Paleolithic (between 45,000 and 12,000 years ago) were capable of artistic flair.

Published in the journal Communications Earth & Environment, their findings challenge long-held narratives of societal “collapse,” instead showing that Rapanui communities were resilient to profound climate stress. Columbia Climate School spoke with lead author Redmond Stein about how the team uncovered this history and what it means for understanding the links between climate and culture.

Archaeologists in Peru have found new evidence showing how the oldest known civilization in the Americas adapted and survived a climate catastrophe without resorting to violence.

A monumental complex built by the Maya around 3,000 years ago was modeled on a map of the cosmos, new fieldwork has revealed. The paper has been published in Science Advances.

In a recent study published in the journal Current Biology, researchers conducted the first systematic paleogenetics analysis of DNA segments inherited from Denisovans, identified in ancient and present-day humans. By tracing these segments over the past 40,000 years, they reconstructed the dynamics of Denisovan ancestry over time and space across continental Eurasia.

The Southern Taurid meteor shower peak on Nov. 4-5 brings the potential for bright meteors and dramatic fireballs.

Imagine early humans meticulously crafting stone tools for nearly 300,000 years, all while contending with recurring wildfires, droughts, and dramatic environmental shifts. A recent study, published in Nature Communications, brought to light remarkable evidence of enduring technological tradition from Kenya’s Turkana Basin.

Image by Rachid Hamatou (Wiki Commons)

New findings reveal the geological age, context, and anatomy of hominin fossils discovered at the Ledi-Geraru Research Project in Ethiopia.

Archaeologists in Iraq have unearthed the remains of a 5,000-year-old building that may have been a temple from the Uruk period, when the first cities in the world were taking off.

Ochre is an iron-rich mineral pigment that was used by many ancient civilizations for color, decoration and practical tasks such as preserving animal hides and tanning clothing. The research was published in the journal Science Advances.

New observations from the James Webb Space Telescope have uncovered five complex organic molecules trapped in the ice around a star outside our galaxy. This cosmic first hints that the stuff of life may be widespread throughout space. See the study published Oct. 20 in the Astrophysical Journal Letters.

A new long-term follow-up study has found that a significant majority of individuals treated for major depressive disorder with psilocybin-assisted therapy were still in remission from their depression five years later. The findings were published in the Journal of Psychedelic Studies.

Researchers have long been attempting to piece together the trek of Neanderthals from Europe into Asia around the Middle and Upper Paleolithic time periods. This time marks the eventual disappearance of Neanderthals and the transition to a Homo-sapien-dominated world…The research is published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

With today’s technology, we cannot bring back Neanderthals. But even if future advances allow it, should we?

Using plain old shiitake mushrooms (Lentinula edodes), scientists have built working memristors – circuitry elements that ‘remember’ their past electrical states – not from titanium dioxide or silicon, but the root-like (and somewhat neuron-like) part of a fungus called the mycelium.