Paleoloxodon antiquus has been extinct for 120 000 years.
By Apotea (Own work) [CC BY-SA 3.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0)], via Wikimedia Commons
Scientists believe since 2010 we have entered the sixth period of mass extinction. CO2 emissions will change the lives of plants and animals in the next three to four decades.
Fossilized teeth from a modern human who lived in Israel close to 200,000 years ago.
Israel Hershkovitz, Tel Aviv University
Rolf Quam, Binghamton University, State University of New York
New discoveries are changing archaeologists’ ideas about the origins of our own species and our migration out of Africa. This fossil pushes Homo sapiens’ African exodus date back by 50,000 years.
As a new David Attenborough documentary examines a remarkable fossil, a leading expert gives his verdict.
An artist’s reconstruction of Kumimanu biceae, a giant ancient penguin, from fossils found in New Zealand.
Reconstruction by G Mayr/Senckenberg Research Institute
Fossilised bones discovered in New Zealand reveal an extinct penguin which may have been the largest to ever live, around the same height as an average man.
Present day Emperor penguins like this would have been dwarfed by the giant find.
Shutterstock
Researchers in human evolution used to focus on Africa and Eurasia – but not anymore. Discoveries in Asia and Australia have changed the picture, revealing early, complex cultures outside of Africa.
An artist’s impression of the Wakaleo schouteni marsupial ‘lion’ challenging a thylacine over the carcass of a kangaroo in the early Miocene rainforest of Riversleigh.
Peter Schouten
‘Marsupial lions’ aren’t really lions - but they did have teeth that formed a pair of secateur-like blades. The newly found species lived in forests of Queensland around 20 million years ago.
Recent research suggests that humankind’s origins lay outside of Africa. This is the nature of science: a paradigm that cannot be questioned on a regular basis becomes a dogma.