In the relentless search to know how the ancestors of humans spread across the world, the latest evidence has revealed that hominins were in Europe at least 1.95 million years ago. Clues on their presence were recently found by researchers at an archaeological site in Romania that could now help explain hominins’ early dispersal out of Africa.A study published in Nature Communications details the prominent find, which predates evidence of hominins previously found at other sites across Europe ...read more
The ability to fly won’t save you from becoming a land predator’s next meal. At least, that’s what one pterosaur may have found out. An international research team recently discovered rare neck vertebrae from a prehistoric flying reptile that was likely bitten by a crocodile-like animal 76 million years ago during the Cretaceous Period. The team published their recent findings in the Journal of Palaeontology.This rare find could help researchers better understand the predator-prey dynami ...read more
Just because we haven’t found dinosaur bones near the equator doesn’t mean they don’t exist — just that we haven’t looked in the right places.A study modeling the extinct beasts’ evolution, published in Current Biology, points to the earliest dinosaurs establishing themselves near the Earth’s center, then spreading out to other parts of the globe. So far, the oldest known dinosaur fossils — dating back about 230 million years — hail from farther south, including Brazil, Argenti ...read more
One of the last things you'd think could be lost is a volcano. Yet, when we look at the record of volcanic activity, even in the past few hundred years, there are signals that a large eruption occurred ... we just don't have any other evidence of the source of that big blast. Slowly but surely, through geochemical sleuthing, some of those mystery eruptions have been matched up with volcanoes. It turns out that many times, that source is more surprising than anticipated.A recent study in the Proc ...read more
Back in the days of yore, language translation was a highly specialized profession, critical for coordinating diplomacy or international trade. The first bilingual dictionary book, Vocabularius ex quo, was a German-Latin set of words published in 1467, while clay tablets containing lists of works in Sumerian and Akkadian date back as early as 2300 B.C.Language translation has become easier over the years in many cases thanks to the work of linguists and other anthropologists. The development of ...read more
Author Vishay SinghPosted on Categories Discover Magazine