Whether for cooking, heating, as a light source or for making tools — it is assumed that fire was essential for the survival of people in the Ice Age. However, it is puzzling that hardly any well-preserved evidence of fireplaces from the coldest…
Category: Paleontology
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Footprints of tail-clubbed armored dinosaurs found for the first time
For the first time, footprints of armoured dinosaurs with tail clubs have been identified, following discoveries made in the Canadian Rockies. The 100-million-year-old fossilized footprints were found at sites at both Tumbler Ridge, BC, and…
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Deep-sea mining risks leads study to urge shift to circular solutions
Deep-sea mining (DSM) not only poses significant environmental, social, and economic risks that may have far-reaching implications for coastal communities and Small Island Developing States (SIDS), it is also likely to negatively affect the…
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Could Spinosaurus swim? The fierce dinosaur ignites debate
Scene: A small patrol boat cruises through the water, just offshore of an island somewhere in the Caribbean. Cue the pounding drums, movie-trailer speak for danger approaching.
Enter: Spinosaurus. Three large spiny sails slice…
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Understanding bones from the remote wilderness of Wyoming
“As a palaeontologist, I’m constantly unearthing surprises — and in some cases, bones that have gone unseen for millions of years.
In this image, taken at the University of Wisconsin Geology Museum in Madison, I’m chipping away a rock to…
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Photic-zone euxinia had a major role in the Devonian-Carboniferous boundary mass extinction
Myrow, P. M. et al. High-precision U–Pb age and duration of the latest Devonian (Famennian) Hangenberg event, and its implications. Terra Nova 26, 222–229 (2014).
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Bizarre New Species of Therizinosaur Had Two-Fingered Hands
Paleontologists have unearthed the fossilized remains of a new and unusual therizinosaurid dinosaur with atypical hands in Mongolia.
Life reconstruction of Duonychus tsogtbaatari. Image credit: Masato Hattori.
Duonychus tsogtbaatari lived in…
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Missing nitrogen: A dramatic game of cosmic hide-and-seek deep within our planet
Imagine if Earth’s history had a mystery novel, and one of its biggest unsolved puzzles was: Where did all the nitrogen go? Scientists have long known that our planet’s rocky outer layers — the mantle — are oddly poor in nitrogen compared to…
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New Genomic Research Sheds More Light on Evolutionary History of Mammoths
Scientists have extracted and analyzed 34 new mammoth (Mammuthus spp.) mitochondrial genomes, including two Early Pleistocene and nine Middle Pleistocene mammoth specimens from Siberia and North America. They have identified the oldest known…
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Ancient tools from a South African cave reveal connections between prehistoric people
In a cave overlooking the ocean on the southern coast of South Africa, archaeologists discovered thousands of stone tools, created by ancient humans roughly 20,000 years ago. By examining tiny details in the chipped edges of the blades and…
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