Origin of Life News

November 22, 2025

Top Headlines

Scientists Find a Surprising Link Between Lead and Human Evolution

Nov. 16, 2025 Researchers found that ancient hominids—including early humans—were exposed to lead throughout childhood, leaving chemical traces in fossil teeth. Experiments suggest this exposure may have driven genetic changes that strengthened ...

Hippos Once Roamed Frozen Germany with Mammoths

Oct. 26, 2025 New research shows that hippos lived in central Europe tens of thousands of years longer than previously thought. Ancient DNA and radiocarbon dating confirm they survived in Germany’s Upper Rhine Graben during a milder Ice Age phase. Closely ...

Ancient DNA Reveals the Deadly Diseases Behind Napoleon’s Defeat

Oct. 26, 2025 Researchers have uncovered microbial evidence in the remains of Napoleon’s soldiers from the 1812 Russian retreat. Genetic analysis revealed pathogens behind paratyphoid and relapsing fever, diseases likely contributing to the army’s massive ...

From Poison to Power: How Lead Exposure Helped Shape Human Intelligence

Oct. 16, 2025 Long before humans built cities or wrote words, our ancestors may have faced a hidden threat that shaped who we became. Scientists studying ancient teeth found that early humans, great apes, and even Neanderthals were exposed to lead millions of ...

Scientists Unearth a 112-million-year-old Time Capsule Filled with Ancient Insects

Oct. 11, 2025 Researchers have unearthed South America’s first amber deposits containing ancient insects in an Ecuadorian quarry, offering a rare 112-million-year-old glimpse into life on the supercontinent ...

The Hidden Denisovan Gene That Helped Humans Conquer a New World

Oct. 7, 2025 Ancient humans crossing the Bering Strait into the Americas carried more than tools and determination—they also carried a genetic legacy from Denisovans, an extinct human relative. A new study reveals that a mysterious gene called MUC19, inherited ...

Ancient DNA Finally Solves the Mystery of the World’s First Pandemic

Aug. 30, 2025 Scientists have finally uncovered direct genetic evidence of Yersinia pestis — the bacterium behind the Plague of Justinian — in a mass grave in Jerash, Jordan. This long-sought discovery resolves a centuries-old debate, confirming that the ...

Scientists Just Uncovered Three Ancient Worlds Frozen Beneath Illinois for 300 Million Years

Aug. 9, 2025 Over 300 million years ago, Illinois teemed with life in tropical swamps and seas, now preserved at the famous Mazon Creek fossil site. Researchers from the University of Missouri and geologist ...

The First Pandemic? Scientists Find 214 Ancient Pathogens in Prehistoric DNA

July 11, 2025 Scientists have uncovered DNA from 214 ancient pathogens in prehistoric humans, including the oldest known evidence of plague. The findings show zoonotic diseases began spreading around 6,500 years ...

New Velvet Worm Species a First for the Arid Karoo

May 30, 2025 A new species of velvet worm, Peripatopsis barnardi, represents the first ever species from the arid Karoo, which indicates that the area was likely historically more forested than at present. In the Cape Fold Mountains, we now know that every ...

New Method Provides the Key to Accessing Proteins in Ancient Human Remains

May 30, 2025 A new method could soon unlock the vast repository of biological information held in the proteins of ancient soft tissues. The findings could open up a new era for palaeobiological ...

Dinosaurs Could Hold Key to Cancer Discoveries

May 29, 2025 New techniques used to analyze soft tissue in dinosaur fossils may hold the key to new cancer discoveries. Researchers have analyzed dinosaur fossils using advanced paleoproteomic techniques, a method that holds promise for uncovering molecular data ...

Latest Headlines

updated 7:16am EST

Fossils Reveal a Massive Shark That Ruled Australia in Dinosaur Times

Nov. 22, 2025 Around 115 million years ago, northern Australia’s seas hosted a colossal shark that rewrites what we thought we knew about early ocean predators. New fossil discoveries show that modern-type ...

Scientists Recover 40,000-Year-Old Mammoth RNA Still Packed With Clues

Nov. 15, 2025 Researchers have sequenced the oldest RNA ever recovered, taken from a woolly mammoth frozen for nearly 40,000 years. The RNA reveals which genes were active in its tissues, offering a rare glimpse ...

Ancient Chinese Tombs Reveal a Hidden 4,000-Year Pattern

Nov. 15, 2025 Researchers digitally mapped ancient Chinese tombs and discovered that their distribution mirrors shifts in political stability, population movements, and natural geography. Peaceful, prosperous eras ...

55-Million-Year-Old Fossils Reveal Bizarre Crocs That Dropped from Trees

Nov. 15, 2025 Scientists uncovered Australia’s oldest known crocodile eggshells, revealing the secret lives of ancient mekosuchine crocodiles that once dominated inland ecosystems. These crocs filled surprising ...

Science Finally Solves a 700-Year-Old Royal Murder

Nov. 14, 2025 Genetic, isotopic, and forensic evidence has conclusively identified the remains of Duke Béla of Macsó and uncovered remarkable details about his life, ancestry, and violent death. The study ...

A 540-Million-Year-Old Fossil Is Rewriting Evolution

Nov. 12, 2025 Over 500 million years ago, the Cambrian Period sparked an explosion of skeletal creativity. Salterella, a peculiar fossil, defied conventions by combining two different mineral-building methods. ...

Archaeologists May Have Finally Solved Peru’s Strange “Band of Holes” Mystery

Nov. 10, 2025 In Peru’s mysterious Pisco Valley, thousands of perfectly aligned holes known as Monte Sierpe have long puzzled scientists. New drone mapping and ...

2.7-Million-Year-Old Tools Reveal Humanity’s First Great Innovation

Nov. 4, 2025 Researchers uncovered a 2.75–2.44 million-year-old site in Kenya showing that early humans maintained stone tool traditions for nearly 300,000 years despite extreme climate swings. The tools, ...

2 Million-Year-Old Teeth Reveal Secrets from the Dawn of Humanity

Nov. 1, 2025 For decades, Paranthropus robustus has intrigued scientists as a powerful, big-jawed cousin of early humans. Now, thanks to ancient protein analysis, researchers have cracked open new secrets hidden ...

Ancient Tides May Have Sparked Humanity’s First Urban Civilization

Oct. 27, 2025 New research shows that the rise of Sumer was deeply tied to the tidal and sedimentary dynamics of ancient Mesopotamia. Early communities harnessed predictable tides for irrigation, but when deltas ...

3,000 Years of Secrets Hidden Beneath Egypt’s Greatest Temple

Oct. 6, 2025 A sweeping new geoarchaeological study has revealed how Egypt’s famed Karnak Temple complex rose from an island amid Nile floods to become one of the ancient world’s most enduring sacred centers. ...

Hidden for 70 Million Years, a Tiny Fossil Fish Is Rewriting Freshwater Evolution

Oct. 4, 2025 Researchers in Alberta uncovered a fossil fish that rewrites the evolutionary history of otophysans, which today dominate freshwater ecosystems. The new species, Acronichthys maccognoi, shows early ...

Scientists Uncover a Mysterious Jurassic Lizard With Snake-Like Jaws

Oct. 2, 2025 A strange Jurassic lizard discovered on Scotland’s Isle of Skye is shaking up what we know about snake evolution. Named Breugnathair elgolensis, the “false snake of Elgol” combined hook-like, ...

Student’s Pinkie-Sized Fossil Reveals a New Croc Species

Sep. 23, 2025 A 95-million-year-old crocodyliform fossil, affectionately nicknamed Elton, was discovered in Montana by student Harrison Allen. Unlike most crocs, it lived on land and ate a varied diet. The find ...

Archaeologists Uncover Lost Land Bridge That May Rewrite Human History

Oct. 12, 2025 New research along Turkey’s Ayvalık coast reveals a once-submerged land bridge that may have helped early humans cross from Anatolia into Europe. Archaeologists uncovered 138 Paleolithic tools ...

Dinosaur Teeth Reveal Secrets of Jurassic Life 150 Million Years Ago

Sep. 7, 2025 Sauropod tooth scratches reveal that some dinosaurs migrated seasonally, others ate a wide variety of plants, and climate strongly shaped their diets. Tanzania’s sand-blasted vegetation left ...

Woolly Mammoth Teeth Reveal the World’s Oldest Microbial DNA

Sep. 5, 2025 Scientists have uncovered microbial DNA preserved in mammoth remains dating back more than one million years, revealing the oldest host-associated microbial DNA ever recovered. By sequencing nearly ...

Extinct Human Relatives Left a Genetic Gift That Helped People Thrive in the Americas

Aug. 24, 2025 Scientists have discovered that a gene called MUC19, inherited from Denisovans through ancient interbreeding, may have played a vital role in helping Indigenous ancestors adapt as they migrated into ...

140,000-Year-Old Skeleton Shows Earliest Interbreeding Between Humans and Neanderthals

Aug. 21, 2025 Scientists have uncovered the world s earliest fossil showing both Neanderthal and Homo sapiens features: a five-year-old child from Israel s Skhul Cave dating back 140,000 years. This discovery ...

Scientists Just Found Rare Spores Inside a Fossil Older Than Dinosaurs

Sep. 27, 2025 Scientists reclassified a long-misunderstood fossil from Brazil as a new genus, Franscinella riograndensis. Using advanced microscopy, they discovered spores preserved in situ—a rare find that ...

New Fossils Reveal a Hidden Branch in Human Evolution

Aug. 27, 2025 Fossils unearthed in Ethiopia are reshaping our view of human evolution. Instead of a straight march from ape-like ancestors to modern humans, researchers now see a tangled, branching tree with ...

Ancient Fossil Discovery in Ethiopia Rewrites Human Origins

Aug. 21, 2025 In the deserts of Ethiopia, scientists uncovered fossils showing that early members of our genus Homo lived side by side with a newly identified species of Australopithecus nearly three million years ...

Tiny Ancient Whale With a Killer Bite Found in Australia

Aug. 13, 2025 An extraordinary fossil find along Victoria’s Surf Coast has revealed Janjucetus dullardi, a sharp-toothed, dolphin-sized predator that lived 26 million years ago. With large eyes, slicing teeth, ...

4,000-Year-Old Teeth Reveal the Earliest Human High — Hidden in Plaque

Aug. 1, 2025 Scientists have discovered the oldest direct evidence of betel nut chewing in Southeast Asia by analyzing 4,000-year-old dental plaque from a burial in Thailand. This breakthrough method reveals ...

500-Million-Year-Old “squid” Were Actually Ferocious Worms

Aug. 25, 2025 A stunning discovery in North Greenland has reclassified strange squid-like fossils, revealing that nectocaridids were not early cephalopods but ancestors of arrow worms. Preserved nervous systems ...

150-Million-Year-Old Teeth Expose Dinosaurs’ Secret Diets

Sep. 14, 2025 By analyzing tooth enamel chemistry, scientists uncovered proof that Jurassic dinosaurs divided up their meals in surprising ways—some choosing buds and leaves, others woody bark, and still others ...

Bizarre Ancient Creatures Unearthed in the Grand Canyon

Aug. 14, 2025 A groundbreaking fossil discovery in the Grand Canyon has unveiled exquisitely preserved soft-bodied animals from the Cambrian period, offering an unprecedented glimpse into early life more than 500 ...

Stunning “wonder Reptile” Discovery Rewrites the Origins of Feathers

Aug. 9, 2025 The newly described Mirasaura grauvogeli from the Middle Triassic had a striking feather-like crest, hinting that complex skin appendages arose far earlier than previously believed. Its bird-like ...

A Dusty Fossil Drawer Held a 300-Million-Year-Old Evolutionary Game-Changer

July 24, 2025 A century-old fossil long mislabeled as a caterpillar has been reidentified as the first-known nonmarine lobopodian—rewriting what we know about ancient life. Discovered in Harvard’s museum ...

Who Are the Papua New Guineans? New DNA Study Reveals Stunning Origins

Sep. 15, 2025 On remote islands of Papua New Guinea, people carry a story that ties us all back to our deepest roots. Although their striking appearance once puzzled scientists, new genetic evidence shows they ...