Archaeologists have dug up a collection of mass-produced bone tools, the earliest ever discovered, suggesting that hominins systematically made tools out of bone around 1 million years earlier than previously thought. Described in a Nature study, the collection contains 27 fossilized tools that were fashioned around 1.5 million years ago. According to the archaeologists, this tool “factory” indicates that hominins exhibited advanced abstract thought early on in their history.“The tools sho ...read more
Tens of thousands of cuneiform tablets are sitting around, just waiting to be translated. It’s not an easy job; the ancient language is based on wedge-shaped pictograms and includes more than 1,000 unique characters that vary by era, geography, and individual writer.But decoding the pictograms could be a culturally and historically significant task. Cuneiform arose about 5,000 years ago in Mesopotamia, in what is now Iraq. It is one of four known pristine languages — writing systems with no ...read more
Earthquakes and secondary disasters like landslides and tsunamis can devastate regions, leaving lasting impacts for years. Beyond the immediate harm to individuals and infrastructure, these events disrupt essential services, alter landscapes, and place a significant economic burden on affected areas.Major earthquakes in the last two decades, such as the 2004 Indian Ocean earthquake, the 2010 Haiti earthquake, the 2011 Japan earthquake, and the 2023 Turkey - Syria earthquake, have highlighted the ...read more
Not that long ago, the idea of a robot performing surgery on a human was something out of science fiction. Today, it’s routine. Robotic surgery increased from 1.8 percent to 15 percent of all surgeries from 2012 to 2018, according to the American College of Surgeons. Today, it’s used for around 22 percent of surgeries, according to several estimates. And no wonder the method is catching on. Robotic surgery (more accurately described as robotic-assisted surgery) offers less bleeding, less ti ...read more
Of all the animals facing a major mass extinction event 252 million years ago, it is perhaps appropriate that frog-like creatures were able to bounce back.The amphibious nature of proto-frogs called temnospondyls provided a food-seeking edge, according to a study in the journal Royal Society Open Science.Surviving a Mass-Extinction EventConditions during the Early Triassic were harsh. Repeated volcanic activity triggered long periods of global warming, aridification, reductions in atmospheric ox ...read more
Author Vishay SinghPosted on Categories Discover Magazine