How catching birds bare-handed may hint at Neandertals’ hunting tactics

Juan Negro crouched in the shadows just outside a cave, wearing his headlamp. For a brief moment, he wasn’t an ornithologist at the Spanish National Research Council’s Doñana Biological Station…

‘Ghost tracks’ suggest people came to the Americas earlier than once thought

Footprints left behind by prehistoric people may be some of the strongest evidence yet that humans arrived in the Americas earlier than previously thought.   Over 60 “ghost tracks” —…

50 years ago, X-rays revealed what ancient Egyptians kept under wraps

Probing pharaohs with X-rays — Science News, October 9, 1971 The 29 mummies of pharaohs and queens were examined without disturbing their present positions.… [Researchers using portable X-ray equipment] found…

Fossils and ancient DNA paint a vibrant picture of human origins

In The Descent of Man, published in 1871, Charles Darwin hypothesized that our ancestors came from Africa. He pointed out that among all animals, the African apes — gorillas and…