Featured
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Research Highlights |
Remains of the moa
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Letter |
Natural and anthropogenic variations in methane sources during the past two millennia
Centennial-scale variations in methane carbon isotope ratios are attributed to changes in pyrogenic and biogenic sources that can be correlated with anthropogenic activities, such as varying levels of biomass burning during the period of the Roman empire and the Han dynasty, and changes in natural climate variability.
- C. J. Sapart
- , G. Monteil
- & T. Röckmann
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News |
African neighbours divided by their genes
Geographically close human populations in southern Africa have been genetically isolated for thousands of years.
- Matt Kaplan
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News |
Studies slow the human DNA clock
Revised estimates of mutation rates bring genetic accounts of human prehistory into line with archaeological data.
- Ewen Callaway
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Research Highlights |
Small families in rich societies
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News |
New DNA analysis shows ancient humans interbred with Denisovans
A new high-coverage DNA sequencing method reconstructs the full genome of Denisovans — relatives to both Neandertals and humans — from genetic fragments in a single finger bone.
- Katherine Harmon
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News |
A Turkish origin for Indo-European languages
Disease-mapping methods add geographical history to language family tree.
- Alyssa Joyce
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News Feature |
Science in the Sahara: Man of the desert
Stefan Kröpelin has carved out a career where few dare to tread — in the heart of the Sahara.
- Quirin Schiermeier
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News |
Shark-tooth weapons reveal lost biodiversity
Three shark species once found in the central Pacific Ocean are now missing.
- Ed Yong
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News |
Climate change drove ancient burial rituals
Development of Chinchorro mummification practices coincided with a population boom, researchers say.
- Helen Thompson
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News |
Fossils point to a big family for human ancestors
Jaw structures suggest that at least three Homo species once roamed the African plains.
- Matt Kaplan
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Research Highlights |
Modern thinking gets older
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Letter |
Evidence for dietary change but not landscape use in South African early hominins
Analyses of strontium elemental and isotopic ratios in fossil teeth show that Australopithecus africanus—the presumed ancestor of early Homo and Paranthropus robustus—had a much more varied diet than Homo and Paranthropus; this sheds light on the diet and home ranges of fossil hominins.
- Vincent Balter
- , José Braga
- & J. Francis Thackeray
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Research Highlights |
Resilient to natural disasters
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Research Highlights |
Lucy's relatives walked upright
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News |
Neanderthals ate their greens
Tooth analysis shows that European hominins roasted vegetables and may have used medicinal plants.
- Matt Kaplan
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Comment |
Run for your life
Humans evolved to run. This helps to explain our athletic capacity and our susceptibility to modern diseases, argue Timothy Noakes and Michael Spedding.
- Timothy Noakes
- & Michael Spedding
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News |
Genomes and fossil faeces track the first Americans
Coprolites from Oregon and Native American DNA suggest that North and South America were colonized in waves.
- Ewen Callaway
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Letter |
Reconstructing Native American population history
A survey of genetic variation in Native American and Siberian populations reveals that Native Americans are descended from at least three streams of gene flow from Asia: after the initial peopling of the continent there was a southward expansion facilitated by the coast, with sequential population splits and little gene flow after divergence, especially in South America.
- David Reich
- , Nick Patterson
- & Andrés Ruiz-Linares
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News & Views |
The ancestral dinner table
Fossils from a new South African site show that some human ancestors ate fruits and leaves, as do most primates today. The finding challenges ideas of why and how the human lineage split from the ancestors of extant apes. See Letter p.90
- Margaret J. Schoeninger
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Obituary |
Phillip Vallentine Tobias (1925–2012)
Palaeoanthropologist who pioneered description of African hominins.
- Bernard Wood
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News Feature |
Science in three dimensions: The print revolution
Three-dimensional printers are opening up new worlds to research.
- Nicola Jones
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Letter |
The diet of Australopithecus sediba
Phytolith, stable carbon isotope, and dental microwear texture data for two individuals of Au. sediba, 2-million-year-old hominins from South Africa, show that they consumed a mostly C3 diet that probably included harder foods, and both dicotyledons (for example, tree leaves, fruits, and wood or bark) and monocotyledons (for example, grasses and sedges); this diet contrasts with previously described diets of other early hominin species.
- Amanda G. Henry
- , Peter S. Ungar
- & Lee Berger
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Research Highlights |
One mummy but three people
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News |
Cuts leave Greek heritage in ruins
Austerity measures damaging archaeological research.
- Leigh Phillips
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Letter |
First dairying in green Saharan Africa in the fifth millennium bc
Lipid biomarker and stable carbon isotope analysis of absorbed food residues in prehistoric pottery from the Libyan Sahara has identified the first adoption of dairying practices in Neolithic Africa in the fifth millennium bc.
- Julie Dunne
- , Richard P. Evershed
- & Savino di Lernia
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News |
Spain claims top spot for world’s oldest cave art
Archaeologists say red disk that is more than 40,000 years old could have been painted by Neanderthals.
- Ewen Callaway
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Research Highlights |
Cultural wellspring
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Correspondence |
Value of submerged early human sites
- Nicholas Flemming
- , Geoffrey N. Bailey
- & Dimitris Sakellariou
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Research Highlights |
Rich milk for poor girls
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News |
Ancestry testing goes for pinpoint accuracy
Companies use whole genomes to trace geographical origins.
- Ewen Callaway
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News & Views |
Homo 'incendius'
An analysis of microscopic and spectroscopic features of sediments deposited in a South African cave one million years ago suggests that human ancestors were using fire much earlier than had been thought.
- Richard G. Roberts
- & Michael I. Bird
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Research Highlights |
Ancient Mayan wall calendar
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News |
Murals offer glimpse of Mayan astronomy
Painted tables may be ancient equivalent of office whiteboards.
- Helen Thompson
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News |
War of words over tribal tongue
Debate highlights pitfalls in studying minority languages.
- Eugenie Samuel Reich
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News |
Development project touts health victory
But critics question data and cost estimates from the Millennium Villages Project.
- Natasha Gilbert
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Editorial |
Young Americans
The rancorous debate over when people first arrived in America has not helped science.
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News Feature |
Special issue: Peopling the planet
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News Feature |
Human migrations: Eastern odyssey
Humans had spread across Asia by 50,000 years ago. Everything else about our original exodus from Africa is up for debate.
- Tim Appenzeller
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Comment |
What makes a modern human
We probably all carry genes from archaic species such as Neanderthals. Chris Stringer explains why the DNA we have in common is more important than any differences.
- Chris Stringer
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News Feature |
Ancient migration: Coming to America
For decades, scientists thought that the Clovis hunters were the first to cross the Arctic to America. They were wrong — and now they need a better theory
- Andrew Curry
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News Feature |
Archaeology: Date with history
By revamping radiocarbon dating, Tom Higham is painting a new picture of humans' arrival in Europe.
- Ewen Callaway
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News |
Early humans linked to large-carnivore extinctions
Hominins could have triggered broad changes to the numbers and diversity of meat-eaters in Africa, researcher says.
- Jeff Tollefson
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News & Views |
50 & 100 years ago
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Books & Arts |
Books in brief
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Books & Arts |
Archaeology: From ploughs to pyramids
Andrew Robinson discovers gems in a grand overview of ancient Egypt and the life of a pioneer in Egyptology.
- Andrew Robinson
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News & Views |
50 & 100 years ago
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