paleontology

A team of researchers in Australia have imaged fossilized soft organs of early jawed vertebrates for the first time, finding that our ancient fish ancestors’ hearts, livers, and stomachs are strikingly similar to ours.

See some of the coolest images recently featured by The Scientist

See some of the coolest images recently featured by The Scientist

Today’s extinction rates are sky-high. But scientists debate if that’s sufficient evidence to conclude that Earth is undergoing a mass extinction event—or whether that’s even a helpful designation.

Extinction is a natural part of life on Earth. But occasionally, extinction rates have surged far beyond usual levels, driving mass extinction events that have reshaped the trajectory of life.

Fossil findings shed light on a little-known group of Cretaceous-era beasts—and indicate that the combination of a large head and diminutive arms was no evolutionary fluke.

A fossil analysis suggests that the yunnanozoan, a wormlike fish that flourished around 520 million years ago, sported structures that were the precursors of the head and jaws of modern vertebrates.

New techniques have shown that people reached the New World far earlier than the long-standing estimate of 13,000 years ago, but scientists still debate exactly when humans arrived on the continent—and how.

Diverse lines of evidence point to humans’ presence in the New World long before the dawn of Clovis culture. But rewriting this chapter of human history raises many questions about how these early people came to inhabit these continents.

Octopuses were around 82 million years earlier than scientists previously thought—and had two extra limbs at the time.

Archaeologist and paleontologist Juan Carlos Cisneros tells The Scientist that researchers frequently fail to involve local groups—and sometimes violate laws—when studying Latin American fossils.

Researchers determined the season during which the meteor struck by studying the bones of fish excavated from a contentious field site.

A new analysis of fossil footprints suggests that the 2-meter-tall, 4- to 5-meter-long carnivores that left them could run nearly 45 kilometers per hour, bolstering the evidence that at least some dinosaurs were speedy, agile hunters.

A report of preserved fragments of nuclei and chromatin in a fossilized femur of a 125-million-year-old Caudipteryx dinosaur elicits skepticism.

A handful of high schoolers prompt scientists to develop a new approach for calculating the size of the ancient behemoth.

A massive, well-preserved skull discovered in China in the 1930s belongs to a new species called Homo longi, researchers report, but experts remain skeptical about the evidence.

A forensic investigation of Seqenenre Taa II’s traumatic injuries suggests he died with his hands tied behind his back, perhaps the end result of fighting to liberate his kingdom.

Listen to a musicologist blow through the oldest known shell horn.

The sperm, belonging to a tiny marine crustacean, dates back nearly 100 million years, making it the most ancient animal sperm found to date.