How Stone Age humans unlocked the glucose in plants

Early cave paintings of hunting scenes may give the impression our Stone Age ancestors lived mainly on chunks of meat, but plants—and the ability to unlock the glucose inside—were just as key to their survival.

Tiny prehistoric lizard sheds light on reptile evolution

The discovery of a new species of prehistoric reptile from Germany is reported this week in Scientific Reports. The anatomical features of the species, named Vellbergia bartholomaei, add to our understanding of the early ...

Ancient gut microbiomes shed light on human evolution

The microbiome of our ancestors might have been more important for human evolution than previously thought, according to a new study published in Frontiers in Ecology and Evolution. An adaptive gut microbiome could have been ...

'Ghost' DNA found in some West African people

A team of researchers at the University of California, has found evidence of "ghost" DNA in some modern West African people. In their paper published in the journal Science Advances, the group describes their study of genetic ...

Human-caused biodiversity decline started millions of years ago

The human-caused biodiversity decline started much earlier than researchers used to believe. According to a new study published in the scientific journal Ecology Letters the process was not started by our own species but ...

Animal embryos evolved before animals

Animals evolved from single-celled ancestors, before diversifying into 30 or 40 distinct anatomical designs. When and how animal ancestors made the transition from single-celled microbes to complex multicellular organisms ...

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