https://phys.org/ en-us Phys.org internet news portal provides the latest news on science including: Physics, Nanotechnology, Life Sciences, Space Science, Earth Science, Environment, Health and Medicine. Small lakes on ancient Mars may have remained liquid for decades, even with average air temperatures well below freezing. https://phys.org/news/2026-01-thin-ice-lake-frozen-mars.html Astrobiology Mon, 05 Jan 2026 16:57:38 EST news686854621 Migration into England was continuous from the Romans through to the Normans and men and women moved from different places and at different rates, a study finds. https://phys.org/news/2026-01-roots-medieval-migration-england-uncovered.html Archaeology Mon, 05 Jan 2026 13:10:03 EST news686839394 In September 2021, a multidisciplinary expedition explored one of the least-known regions of the Bolivian Amazon: the Great Tectonic Lakes of Exaltación in the department of Beni. https://phys.org/news/2025-11-landscape-clues-indigenous-peoples-southwestern.html Archaeology Thu, 06 Nov 2025 00:00:02 EST news681555782 Malaria is one of the world's most widespread and deadliest parasitic diseases. But some people may have natural protection thanks to DNA inherited from an extinct group of archaic humans known as the Denisovans. New research has looked at specific Denisovan-derived genes that may protect against this and other tropical diseases. https://phys.org/news/2025-09-dna-ancient-denisovan-ancestors-tropical.html Evolution Tue, 16 Sep 2025 13:00:01 EDT news677245416 Pterosaurs, which dominated the skies of the Triassic, Jurassic and Cretaceous periods, first evolved to take to the air in warm and humid conditions during the Late Triassic, a new study suggests. https://phys.org/news/2025-06-ancient-flying-reptiles-winners-triassic.html Evolution Wed, 18 Jun 2025 05:00:01 EDT news669396121 The Pliocene epoch, which lasted from 5.3 million to 2.6 million years ago, was a consequential time in Earth's history. The Isthmus of Panama formed, connecting North and South America, and the accumulation of ice at the poles reshaped the world's biogeography. https://phys.org/news/2025-02-ancient-climate-reconstruction-future-ocean.html Earth Sciences Tue, 04 Feb 2025 12:15:04 EST news657893701 The ratios of strontium isotopes in fossil shark teeth can be used to better understand how coastal environments evolved in ancient times, according to our newly published work in Palaeogeography, Palaeoclimatology, Palaeoecology. https://phys.org/news/2025-02-fossil-shark-teeth-abundant-date.html Evolution Mon, 03 Feb 2025 13:07:18 EST news657810433 In an important discovery, archaeologists from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and the National Academy of Sciences of Tajikistan have uncovered a multi-layered archaeological site in the Zeravshan Valley, central Tajikistan, shedding rare light on early human settlement in the region. The findings from the site, known as Soii Havzak, provide crucial evidence that Central Asia played a vital role in early human migration and development. https://phys.org/news/2024-11-multi-layered-site-tajikistan-zeravshan.html Archaeology Mon, 04 Nov 2024 12:11:03 EST news649944661 Two common ingredients in ordinary chewing gum—Arabic gum and lecithin—have been found to help improve the overall health of tilapia, helping these fish survive better even in cold climates. This discovery paves the way for raising tilapia for food outside of the tropical regions where they are commonly farmed. https://phys.org/news/2024-09-ingredients-gum-tilapia-survive-cold.html Plants & Animals Wed, 25 Sep 2024 13:08:38 EDT news646488516 Ancient viruses preserved in glacial ice hold valuable information about changes in Earth's climate, a new study suggests. https://phys.org/news/2024-08-glacier-virus-extreme-weather-climate.html Earth Sciences Mon, 26 Aug 2024 11:40:04 EDT news643891201 Despite decades of research, there's still much scholars don't understand about life's beginnings and early evolution. A UC Riverside paper has opened the door to understanding more and to framing future studies that could help predict climate change and the search for life beyond Earth. https://phys.org/news/2024-07-early-life-earth-planets.html Astrobiology Tue, 09 Jul 2024 10:03:04 EDT news639738181 Many reports from antiquity about outbreaks of plague mention Egypt as the source of pestilences that reached the Mediterranean. But was this really the case? Researchers from the University of Basel are conducting a critical analysis of the ancient written and documentary evidence combined with archaeogenetic findings to add some context to the traditional view. https://phys.org/news/2023-12-plague-egypt-myth-reality.html Archaeology Tue, 12 Dec 2023 10:29:03 EST news621599341 Simon Fraser University scientists say their research on the latest fossil find near Princeton, B.C. is raising questions about how the dispersal of animals and plants occurred across the Northern Hemisphere some 50 million years ago, including whether brief intervals of global warming were at play. https://phys.org/news/2023-03-giant-ant-fossil-ancient-arctic.html Evolution Tue, 07 Mar 2023 15:21:03 EST news597424861 A unique artifact discovered at the Roman fort of Vindolanda may have been used as a device during sex rather than as a good luck symbol, archaeologists suggest. https://phys.org/news/2023-02-discarded-roman-artifact-good-luck.html Archaeology Mon, 20 Feb 2023 10:06:07 EST news596109964 A team of researchers from the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, the Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History, the British School at Athens and Temple University has found evidence of pathogens in the teeth of individuals from the Bronze Age that could explain why two ancient civilizations failed. In their paper published in the journal Current Biology, the group describes their genetic study of teeth found inside a cave called Hagios Charalambos on the island of Crete. https://phys.org/news/2022-08-evidence-pathogens-ancient-dna-fall.html Archaeology Mon, 08 Aug 2022 10:27:27 EDT news579173242 Many of us know the conventional theory of how the dinosaurs died 66 million years ago: in Earth's fiery collision with a meteorite, and a following global winter as dust and debris choked the atmosphere. But there was a previous extinction, far more mysterious and less discussed: the one 202 million years ago, which killed off the big reptiles who up until then ruled the planet, and apparently cleared the way for dinosaurs to take over. What caused the so-called Triassic-Jurassic Extinction, and why did dinosaurs thrive when other creatures died? https://phys.org/news/2022-07-dinosaurs-ice-warmth-ancient-mass.html Evolution Fri, 01 Jul 2022 14:00:04 EDT news575872844 For decades, paleobotanist David Greenwood has collected fossil plants from Australia—some so well preserved it's hard to believe they're millions of years old. These fossils hold details about the ancient world in which they thrived, and Greenwood and a team of researchers including climate modeler and research David Hutchinson, from the University of New South Wales, and UConn Department of Geosciences paleobotanist Tammo Reichgelt, have begun the process of piecing together the evidence to see what more they could learn from the collection. Their findings are published in Paleoceanography & Paleoclimatology. https://phys.org/news/2022-05-fossil-reveal-lush-southern-hemisphere.html Paleontology & Fossils Tue, 31 May 2022 09:35:12 EDT news573208509 After collecting eight rock-core samples from its first science campaign and completing a record-breaking, 31-Martian-day (or sol) dash across about 3 miles (5 kilometers) of Mars, NASA's Perseverance rover arrived at the doorstep of Jezero Crater's ancient river delta April 13. Dubbed "Three Forks" by the Perseverance team (a reference to the spot where three route options to the delta merge), the location serves as the staging area for the rover's second science expedition, the "Delta Front Campaign." https://phys.org/news/2022-04-perseverance-rover-ancient-river-delta.html Planetary Sciences Tue, 19 Apr 2022 14:30:24 EDT news569597410 The formation of the greenhouse gas methane is based on a universal mechanism. Scientists at Heidelberg University and the Max Planck Institute for Terrestrial Microbiology in Marburg have made this discovery. The interdisciplinary research team under the direction of Prof. Dr. Frank Keppler from the Institute of Earth Sciences and Dr. Ilka Bischofs from the BioQuant Center of Ruperto Carola found out that methane arises in the cells of organisms by a purely chemical process. The studies provide, inter alia, an explanation for why methane is released not only through the activity of special microorganisms but—as observed for quite some time now—also by plants and mushrooms. The current findings are an important step towards understanding aerobic methane formation in the environment. https://phys.org/news/2022-03-universal-mechanism-methane-formation.html Cell & Microbiology Thu, 10 Mar 2022 07:45:25 EST news566120721 The tiny, pale surf clam about the size of a fingernail that most people have seen and collected on beaches around the world holds clues in its shell to Earth's past. For the first time, researchers have been able to identify the monthly, and even weekly, ocean temperatures recorded in these smooth clam shells. Because ancient civilizations consumed these ubiquitous clams and left the shells at archaeological sites, researchers now have a new way to reconstruct climate and its fluctuations from nearly 3,000 years ago. https://phys.org/news/2021-12-climate-clam-shells.html Earth Sciences Tue, 14 Dec 2021 11:38:10 EST news558704286 Researchers at the University of Zurich have investigated a unique leather scale armor found in the tomb of a horse rider in Northwest China. Design and construction details of the armor indicate that it originated in the Neo-Assyrian Empire between the 6th and 8th century BCE before being brought to China. https://phys.org/news/2021-12-year-old-leather-armor-technology-antiquity.html Archaeology Wed, 08 Dec 2021 13:10:06 EST news558187638 New research shows that humans had a significant role in the extinction of wooly mammoths in Eurasia, occurring thousands of years later than previously thought. https://phys.org/news/2021-11-humans-hastened-extinction-wooly-mammoth.html Ecology Thu, 11 Nov 2021 12:14:25 EST news555855262 It is increasingly clear that the prolonged drought conditions, record-breaking heat, sustained wildfires, and frequent, more extreme storms experienced in recent years are a direct result of rising global temperatures brought on by humans' addition of carbon dioxide to the atmosphere. And a new MIT study on extreme climate events in Earth's ancient history suggests that today's planet may become more volatile as it continues to warm. https://phys.org/news/2021-08-global-begets-paleoclimate.html Earth Sciences Wed, 11 Aug 2021 14:00:05 EDT news547879893 Over hundreds of thousands of years, sediments from southern Greenland have been making their way into the ocean, where they're carried by underwater currents to a location in the Labrador Sea called the Eirik Drift. https://phys.org/news/2021-05-ocean-bottom-sediments-story-ancient-greenland.html Earth Sciences Mon, 10 May 2021 15:00:04 EDT news539850836 Fossil discoveries often help answer long-standing questions about how our modern world came to be. However, sometimes they only deepen the mystery—as a recent discovery of four new species of ancient insects in British Columbia and Washington state is proving. https://phys.org/news/2021-04-fossil-discovery-deepens-snakefly-mystery.html Paleontology & Fossils Tue, 06 Apr 2021 16:18:14 EDT news536944690 One day, humankind may step foot on another habitable planet. That planet may look very different from Earth, but one thing will feel familiar—the rain. https://phys.org/news/2021-04-size-raindrops-potentially-habitable-planets.html Astronomy Mon, 05 Apr 2021 16:51:59 EDT news536860305 Microscopic fossilized shells are helping geologists reconstruct Earth's climate during the Paleocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum (PETM), a period of abrupt global warming and ocean acidification that occurred 56 million years ago. Clues from these ancient shells can help scientists better predict future warming and ocean acidification driven by human-caused carbon dioxide emissions. https://phys.org/news/2021-03-oceans-stressed-abrupt-prehistoric-global.html Earth Sciences Mon, 08 Mar 2021 12:59:48 EST news534430783 Once upon a time, seasons in Gale Crater probably felt something like those in Iceland. But nobody was there to bundle up more than 3 billion years ago. https://phys.org/news/2021-01-mars-felt-iceland.html Astronomy Thu, 21 Jan 2021 09:21:45 EST news530443301 Oxygen levels in the ancient oceans were surprisingly resilient to climate change, new research suggests. https://phys.org/news/2021-01-resilience-oceans-climate.html Environment Fri, 15 Jan 2021 05:00:01 EST news529906661 Water and air are highly mutable resources that exist in a myriad of physical states and dimensions, and due to their affectivity, these entities participate in a multitude of interactions capable of sustaining life, transforming environments, and shaping human behavior. As air and water circulate between the atmosphere and the landscape through the process of evapotranspiration, humans interact with and form relationships—or bio-cultural associations—with these substances. Facets of human life, like breathing, cooking, bathing, agriculture, and engaging with the outdoors, become intertwined with a region's hydroclimate. Interactions with air and water, in turn, influence the ways humans construct and modify their societies. https://phys.org/news/2020-12-climate-catalyst-greater-cahokia.html Environment Wed, 02 Dec 2020 15:35:33 EST news526145731