Research Briefing |
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Article
| Open AccessExtensive pedigrees reveal the social organization of a Neolithic community
The burial community at Gurgy ‘les Noisats’ (France) was genetically connected by two main pedigrees, spanning seven generations, that were patrilocal and patrilineal, with evidence for female exogamy and exchange with genetically close neighbouring groups.
- Maïté Rivollat
- , Adam Benjamin Rohrlach
- & Wolfgang Haak
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Article
| Open AccessEarly contact between late farming and pastoralist societies in southeastern Europe
Archaeogenetic analysis of 135 individuals from the zone between southeastern Europe and the northwestern Black Sea region indicates contacts between farming and pastoralist populations at the end of the Copper Age.
- Sandra Penske
- , Adam B. Rohrlach
- & Wolfgang Haak
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News |
Ancient-DNA researcher fired for ‘serious misconduct’ lands new role
Former co-workers have expressed shock that Charles Sturt University in southeastern Australia has appointed Alan Cooper to its faculty.
- Dyani Lewis
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News |
Hunter-gatherer lifestyle fosters thriving gut microbiome
Samples from the Tanzanian Hadza group included species previously unknown to science.
- Gemma Conroy
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News |
Laos cave fossils prompt rethink of human migration map
A skull fragment and shin bone suggest that early modern humans might have passed through southeast Asia earlier than thought.
- Jude Coleman
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News & Views |
Ancient DNA reveals how farming spread into northwest Africa
Genomic data from bones and teeth found at archaeological sites across Morocco paint a picture of how Neolithic farmers and pastoralists spread into northwest Africa that is more complex than previously thought.
- Louise Humphrey
- & Abdeljalil Bouzouggar
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Article
| Open AccessNorthwest African Neolithic initiated by migrants from Iberia and Levant
Genome sequencing of nine individuals shows ancestry shifts in the Neolithization of northwestern Africa that probably mirrored a heterogeneous economic and cultural landscape in a more multifaceted process than observed in other regions.
- Luciana G. Simões
- , Torsten Günther
- & Mattias Jakobsson
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News & Views |
From the archive: ancient timelines and a west-side story of cities
Snippets from Nature’s past.
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Where I Work |
I use a robot to restore Pompeii’s shattered frescoes
Cultural and heritage researcher Arianna Traviglia uses robotic technology to painstakingly reconstruct 2,000-year-old mural paintings in Pompeii.
- Stav Dimitropoulos
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News |
Human-evolution story rewritten by fresh data and more computing power
Humans did not emerge from a single region of Africa, suggests a powerful modelling study. Rather, our ancestors moved and intermingled for millennia.
- Jude Coleman
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Research Highlight |
Oldest known ‘blueprints’ aided human hunters 9,000 years ago
Prehistoric engravings depict vast hunting traps with extraordinary precision.
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Article |
A weakly structured stem for human origins in Africa
An analysis of models of human populations in Africa, using some newly sequenced genomes, finds that human origins in the continent can best be described by a weakly structured stem model.
- Aaron P. Ragsdale
- , Timothy D. Weaver
- & Simon Gravel
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Research Briefing |
Ancient woman’s DNA recovered from a 20,000-year-old pendant
An innovative method was used to obtain a woman’s rich DNA record from a 20,000-year-old pendant found in Siberia, providing the first direct genetic evidence for the identity of an individual who handled an object in the deep past.
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News |
Prehistoric pendant’s DNA reveals the person who held it
An innovative method reveals that an ancient trinket was handled by a woman some 20,000 years ago.
- Elissa Welle
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Review Article |
Reappraising the palaeobiology of Australopithecus
This Review examines the palaeobiology of Australopithecus in terms of morphology, phylogeny, diet, tool use, locomotor behaviour and other characteristics, and considers the role of this genus of hominins in human evolution.
- Zeresenay Alemseged
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Article
| Open AccessAncient human DNA recovered from a Palaeolithic pendant
A non-destructive DNA isolation method for the stepwise release of DNA trapped in ancient tooth and bone artefacts is developed.
- Elena Essel
- , Elena I. Zavala
- & Matthias Meyer
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Research Highlight |
Ancient Norse on Greenland imported wood from distant shores
Settlers brought in hemlock and other types of timber much earlier than previously realized.
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News |
‘Truly gobsmacked’: Ancient-human genome count surpasses 10,000
The majority of sequences come from people who lived in Western Eurasia, but samples from other regions are on the rise.
- Ewen Callaway
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Research Highlight |
Burials reveal women’s high status in ancient Mongolia
Xiongnu women were honoured with artful coffins and other signs of social leadership.
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Research Highlight |
Hair buried in a cave shows hallucinogen use in ancient Europe
Ritually shorn strands suggest that people living some 3,000 years ago consumed plants with mind-altering properties.
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Research Highlight |
Finery in an Anglo-Saxon grave came from African ivory
An ornament buried with an elite woman from the fifth or sixth century ad was probably made in an East African workshop.
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News |
Ancient DNA illuminates Swahili culture’s origins
Genomes uncovered from centuries-old East African towns revise conclusions of colonial science.
- Ewen Callaway
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Research Briefing |
Medieval Swahili people had both African and Asian ancestry
Analyses of ancient DNA from 80 individuals buried in medieval Swahili stone towns along the East African coast revealed that these individuals had both African and Asian ancestry. The findings suggest that in most cases, African women began having children with Asian men at least 1,000 years ago, at several locations along the coast.
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Article
| Open AccessEntwined African and Asian genetic roots of medieval peoples of the Swahili coast
Analysis of ancient human DNA from the Swahili coast reveals that predominantly African female ancestors and Asian male ancestors formed families after around ad 1000 and lived in elite communities in coastal stone towns.
- Esther S. Brielle
- , Jeffrey Fleisher
- & Chapurukha M. Kusimba
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News & Views |
From the archive: ancient mazes, and ants under observation
Snippets from Nature’s past.
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News |
Kidnapping of scientists threatens field research in Papua New Guinea
After a group of archaeologists was taken hostage, researchers are looking to beef up security and reassess risk.
- Bianca Nogrady
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News & Views |
The genomic history of ice-age Europeans
An extensive genomic time series has been produced for 356 humans from across ice-age Europe. The data reveal how climate change affected the ranges of hunter-gatherer populations as they developed diverse cultures.
- Ludovic Orlando
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Article
| Open AccessPalaeogenomics of Upper Palaeolithic to Neolithic European hunter-gatherers
Combined analysis of new genomic data from 116 ancient hunter-gatherer individuals together with previously published data provides insights into the genetic structure and demographic shifts of west Eurasian forager populations over a period of 30,000 years.
- Cosimo Posth
- , He Yu
- & Johannes Krause
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News |
Europe’s first humans hunted with bows and arrows
A cave site in France holds hundreds of tiny stone points, alongside remains thought to belong to Homo sapiens.
- Ewen Callaway
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News |
Tree rings reveal drought that might have doomed the Hittites
Three years of minimal rain could have forced the ancient civilization to abandon its capital — and perhaps triggered the empire’s ultimate collapse.
- Miryam Naddaf
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News |
Ancient stone tools suggest early humans dined on hippo
Fossils and artefacts unearthed in Kenya suggest our ancestors used stone stools to feed on large animals in the distant past.
- Freda Kreier
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News & Views |
Signs of ancient climate crisis as the Hittite empire unravelled
An assessment of juniper tree-ring samples from central Turkey, together with other types of dating analysis, demonstrate that a devastating drought in 1198–1196 bc contributed to the end of the Hittite empire.
- Müge Durusu-Tanrıöver
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Article
| Open AccessSevere multi-year drought coincident with Hittite collapse around 1198–1196 bc
Tree-ring analysis is correlated with stable isotope data and historical texts to identify an unusual multi-year period of drought from around 1198 to 1196 bc associated with the collapse of the Hittite Empire.
- Sturt W. Manning
- , Cindy Kocik
- & Jed P. Sparks
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News & Views |
Recipes and ingredients for ancient Egyptian mummification
What ingredients and processes underlay mummification in ancient Egypt? The molecular analysis of labelled pots excavated from an embalming workshop provides some answers to this question.
- Salima Ikram
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News |
The surprising chemicals used to embalm Egyptian mummies
Resins used to prepare bodies for the afterlife are found in vessels in an ancient workshop.
- Ewen Callaway
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Nature Podcast |
How mummies were prepared: Ancient Egyptian pots spill secrets
Analysis of substances uncovered in embalming workshop gives insight into the mummification process, and how CAR T therapies could turbocharge cancer treatments.
- Nick Petrić Howe
- & Benjamin Thompson
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Research Highlight |
Neanderthals stashed dozens of animal skulls in a cave — but why?
Remnants of ancient bison and other large mammals might have been kept as hunting trophies.
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Technology Feature |
Seven technologies to watch in 2023
Nature’s pick of tools and techniques that are poised to have an outsized impact on science in the coming year.
- Michael Eisenstein
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Nature Podcast |
The Nature Podcast’s highlights of 2022
The team select some of their favourite stories from the past 12 months.
- Benjamin Thompson
- , Shamini Bundell
- & Noah Baker
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Research Highlight |
Revealed: massive Maya structures built by vast labour forces
Pyramids, causeways and other edifices formed a densely settled Maya realm in what is now Guatemala.
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Research Highlight |
Prehistoric carvings are oldest known story sequence
Two carved panels discovered in what is now Turkey illustrate a tale involving leopards and a bull.
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News |
Ancient skull uncovered in China could be million-year-old Homo erectus
Fieldwork is under way to excavate a rare, well-preserved specimen in central China.
- Dyani Lewis
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Research Highlight |
Prehistoric rubbish hints that early cooks cared about flavour
Ancient chefs made bitter plants taste better with techniques such as grinding and soaking.
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Book Review |
The rise of scientific racism in palaeoanthropology
A forensic anthropologist unmasks insidious interpretations of fossil finds.
- Fatimah Jackson
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News |
First known Neanderthal family discovered in Siberian cave
Ancient DNA from closely related individuals offers fresh insight into Neanderthals’ lives and social structures.
- Ewen Callaway
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Article
| Open AccessGenetic insights into the social organization of Neanderthals
Genetic data for 13 Neanderthals from 2 Middle Palaeolithic sites in the Altai Mountains of southern Siberia presented provide insights into the social organization of an isolated Neanderthal community at the easternmost extent of their known range.
- Laurits Skov
- , Stéphane Peyrégne
- & Benjamin M. Peter
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Research Highlight |
Ancient Greenlanders hunted huge whales — and little reindeer
Genomic analysis hints that the island’s early residents had the technology and know-how to catch some of the biggest animals on Earth.
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News Feature |
Saving the Amazon: how science is helping Indigenous people protect their homelands
Drug runners, gold miners and loggers are rapidly invading the remote Peruvian Amazon, home to isolated people and a wealth of biodiversity. Nature met the researchers and Indigenous communities fighting to stop the destruction.
- Jeff Tollefson
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Research Highlight |
Ancient DNA suggests that artificial islands were party spots for the elite
Island settlements called crannogs served as larders, abattoirs — and perhaps feasting sites.