Human Evolution News

December 23, 2024

Top Headlines

A New Timeline for Neanderthal Interbreeding With Modern Humans

Dec. 12, 2024 — Neanderthal genes make up 1-2% of the genomes of non-Africans. Scientists analyzed the lengths of regions of Neanderthal DNA in 58 ancient Eurasian genomes of early modern humans and determined that the introgressed genes result from interbreeding ...

Oldest Modern Human Genomes Sequenced

Dec. 12, 2024 — Few genomes have been sequenced from early modern humans, who first arrived in Europe when the region was already inhabited by Neanderthals. An international team has now sequenced the oldest modern human genomes to date. The genomes were recovered ...

Earliest Deep-Cave Ritual Compound in Southwest Asia Discovered

Dec. 9, 2024 — A cave in Galilee, Israel, has yielded evidence for ritualistic gathering 35,000 years ago, the earliest on the Asian ...

Chimpanzees Perform the Same Complex Behaviors That Have Brought Humans Success

Dec. 5, 2024 — A new study suggests that the fundamental abilities underlying human language and technological culture may have evolved before humans and apes diverged millions of years ...

Latest Headlines

updated 11:25pm EST

A Fossil First: Scientists Find 1.5-Million-Year-Old Footprints of Two Different Species of Human Ancestors at Same Spot

Nov. 28, 2024 — More than a million years ago, on a hot savannah teeming with wildlife near the shore of what would someday become Lake Turkana in Kenya, two ...

Brains Grew Faster as Humans Evolved

Nov. 27, 2024 — Brain size increased gradually within each ancient human species rather than through sudden leaps between ...

The Secrets of Fossil Teeth Revealed by the Synchrotron: A Long Childhood Is the Prelude to the Evolution of a Large Brain

Nov. 13, 2024 — Could social bonds be the key to human big brains? A study of the fossil teeth of early Homo from Georgia dating back 1.77 million years reveals a ...

New Insights Into the Denisovans: New Hominin Group That Interbred With Modern Day Humans

Nov. 8, 2024 — Scientists believe individuals of the most recently discovered 'hominin' group (the Denisovans) that interbred with modern day humans passed on some ...

Early Human Species Benefited from Food Diversity in Steep Mountainous Terrain

Oct. 9, 2024 — A new study shows that the patchwork of different ecosystems found in mountainous regions played a key role in the evolution of ...

Fossils and Fires: Insights Into Early Modern Human Activity in the Jungles of Southeast Asia

Oct. 10, 2024 — Studying microscopic layers of dirt dug from the Tam Pa Ling cave site in northeastern Laos has provided a team of archaeologists further insights ...

Underwater Caves Yield New Clues About Sicily's First Residents

Oct. 9, 2024 — Archaeological surveys suggest that coastal and underwater cave sites in southern Sicily contain important new clues about the path and fate of early human migrants to the ...

The Neanderthals May Have Become Extinct Because of Their Isolated Lifestyle

Sep. 11, 2024 — Neanderthal remains recently discovered in a cave in France support well-known theory of why the Neanderthals became extinct, researchers behind a ...

New Population Model Identifies Phases of Human Dispersal Across Europe

Sep. 4, 2024 — Researchers have developed a model that captures the dynamics of human dispersal across the continent during the last Ice Age in unprecedented ...

Fossil Hotspots in Africa Obscure a More Complete Picture of Human Evolution

Aug. 20, 2024 — A new study shows how the mismatch between where fossils are preserved and where humans likely lived may influence our understanding of early human ...

Smallest Arm Bone in Human Fossil Record Sheds Light on the Dawn of Homo Floresiensis

Aug. 6, 2024 — A new study reports the discovery of extremely rare early human fossils from the Indonesian island of Flores, including an astonishingly small adult limb bone. Dated to about 700,000 years old, the ...

'A History of Contact': Geneticists Are Rewriting the Narrative of Neanderthals and Other Ancient Humans

July 11, 2024 — Using genomes from 2,000 living humans as well as three Neanderthals and one Denisovan, an international team mapped the gene flow between the hominin groups over the past quarter-million ...

Extinct Humans Survived on the Tibetan Plateau for 160,000 Years

July 3, 2024 — Bone remains found in a Tibetan cave 3,280 m above sea level indicate an ancient group of humans survived here for many ...

Origins of Cumulative Culture in Human Evolution

June 17, 2024 — Cumulative culture -- the accumulation of technological modifications and improvements over generations -- allowed humans to adapt to a diversity of environments and challenges. But, it is unclear ...

Early Homo Sapiens Facilitated the Establishment of the Bonelli's Eagle in the Mediterranean 50,000 Years Ago

June 14, 2024 — Scientists have unraveled the ancestral history of one of the most iconic birds of prey in the current Iberian fauna: the Bonelli's eagle (Aquila fasciata). The study combines evidence from ...

75,000-Year-Old Female Neanderthal from Cave Where Species Buried Their Dead

May 1, 2024 — A new documentary has recreated the face of a 75,000-year-old female Neanderthal whose flattened skull was discovered and rebuilt from hundreds of bone fragments by a team of archaeologists and ...

Revised Dating of the Liujiang Skeleton Renews Understanding of Human Occupation of China

May 1, 2024 — Researchers have provided new age estimates and revised provenance information for the Liujiang human fossils, shedding light on the presence of Homo sapiens in the region. Using advanced dating ...

How Evolving Landscapes Impacted First Peoples' Early Migration Patterns Into Australia

Apr. 30, 2024 — Scientists have applied a dynamic model of the landscape to patterns of human migration into Sahul, the combined continent of Australia, Tasmania and New ...

Genetic Variant Identified That Shaped the Human Skull Base

Apr. 17, 2024 — Researchers have identified a variant in the gene TBX1 as key in the development of the unique morphology at the base of the skull. TBX1 is present at higher levels in humans than in closely related ...

Interspecies Competition Led to Even More Forms of Ancient Human -- Defying Evolutionary Trends in Vertebrates

Apr. 17, 2024 — Competition between species played a major role in the rise and fall of hominins -- and produced a 'bizarre' evolutionary pattern for the Homo lineage -- according to a new study that ...

Persian Plateau Unveiled as Crucial Hub for Early Human Migration out of Africa

Mar. 25, 2024 — A new study combining genetic, palaeoecological, and archaeological evidence has unveiled the Persian Plateau as a pivotal geographic location serving as a hub for Homo sapiens during the early ...

Did Neanderthals Use Glue? Researchers Find Evidence That Sticks

Feb. 21, 2024 — Neanderthals created stone tools held together by a multi-component adhesive, a team of scientists has discovered. Its findings, which are the earliest evidence of a complex adhesive in Europe, ...

Great Apes Playfully Tease Each Other

Feb. 13, 2024 — Babies playfully tease others as young as eight months of age. Since language is not required for this behavior, similar kinds of playful teasing might be present in non-human animals. Now cognitive ...

Innovation in Stone Tool Technology Involved Multiple Stages at the Time of Modern Human Dispersals

Feb. 7, 2024 — A new study illuminates the cultural evolution that took place approximately 50,000 to 40,000 years ago, coinciding with the dispersals of Homo sapiens across Eurasia. The insights gleaned from their ...

Neanderthals and Humans Lived Side by Side in Northern Europe 45,000 Years Ago

Jan. 31, 2024 — Archaeologists have debated whether Neanderthals or modern humans made stone tools that are found at sites across northern Europe and date from about 40,000 years ago. A new excavation at one site in ...

How Did Humans Learn to Walk? New Evolutionary Study Offers an Earful

Jan. 29, 2024 — A new study, which centers on evidence from skulls of a 6-million-year-old fossil ape, Lufengpithecus, offers important clues about the origins of bipedal locomotion courtesy of a novel method: ...

Paleolithic Humans May Have Understood the Properties of Rocks for Making Stone Tools

Dec. 1, 2023 — Research suggests that Paleolithic humans in the Middle East selected flint for their cutting tools based on differences in the mechanical properties of the rock. They seem to have purposefully ...

Dishing the Dirt on Human Evolution: Why Scientific Techniques Matter in Archaeology

Nov. 30, 2023 — Scientists should seek answers hidden in the dirt using proven and state-of-the-art archaeological science techniques to support new discoveries about human evolution following recent controversies ...

Neanderthals Were the World's First Artists, Research Reveals

Nov. 21, 2023 — Recent research has shown that engravings in a cave in La Roche-Cotard (France), which has been sealed for thousands of years, were actually made by Neanderthals. The findings reveal that the ...

No Scientific Evidence for Cognitively Advanced Behaviors and Symbolism by Homo Naledi

Nov. 13, 2023 — A new study casts doubt on claims that Homo naledi, a small-brained hominin dating to between 335-241,000 years ago, deliberately buried their dead and produced rock art in Rising Star Cave, South ...