A drying climate caused a mass extinction among plants, but paved the way for the ancestors of modern reptiles, mammals, and birds.
Articles on Fossils
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This new research offers compelling proof that the naysayers were right. “Mrs” Ples was actually a “Mr”.
Scientists believe since 2010 we have entered the sixth period of mass extinction. CO2 emissions will change the lives of plants and animals in the next three to four decades.
New discoveries are changing archaeologists’ ideas about the origins of our own species and our migration out of Africa. This fossil pushes Homo sapiens’ African exodus date back by 50,000 years.
Lepidoptera insects are at least 70m years older than we previously knew.
As a new David Attenborough documentary examines a remarkable fossil, a leading expert gives his verdict.
Fossilised bones discovered in New Zealand reveal an extinct penguin which may have been the largest to ever live, around the same height as an average man.
Scientists in New Zealand have discovered an extinct penguin known as Kumimanu biceae that was 1.77m tall.
Researchers in human evolution used to focus on Africa and Eurasia – but not anymore. Discoveries in Asia and Australia have changed the picture, revealing early, complex cultures outside of Africa.
‘Marsupial lions’ aren’t really lions - but they did have teeth that formed a pair of secateur-like blades. The newly found species lived in forests of Queensland around 20 million years ago.
Researchers use CT scanners to take first look inside pterosaur eggs.
Scientists can be overly thirsty for dinosaur blood.
One animator combined his skills with paleontological evidence to breathe movement into a dinosaur fossil to eye-catching effect.
Reconstructing the colours of the feathered Sinosauropteryx gives hints about its habitat and lifestyle.
Recent research suggests that humankind’s origins lay outside of Africa. This is the nature of science: a paradigm that cannot be questioned on a regular basis becomes a dogma.
Until this discovery, theropod dinosaurs were thought to be considerably smaller, at three to five metres in body length, during the Early Jurassic.
Maeve, age 8, has a question that has stumped many scientists over the years. And that’s because it’s a surprisingly tricky question to answer. It depends a bit on what you mean by ‘person’.
Bones and texts showed how decades of strenuous hikes led to higher levels of osteoarthritis in workers’ knees and ankles in an ancient Egyptian village.
A rush of ancient DNA projects in Africa has presented the curators of archaeological skeletons with ethical issues because research requires the destruction of human bone.
Two fossils found in South Africa provide direct evidence of parental care in extinct pre-mammalian ancestors.
Top contributors
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Research Associate, African Centre for Coastal Palaeoscience, Nelson Mandela University
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Associate professor in Vertebrate Palaeontology, University of the Witwatersrand
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Emeritus Strategic Professor in Palaeontology, Flinders University
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Professor of Vertebrate Palaeontology, University of Bristol
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Senior Research Scientist, South Australian Museum; Flinders University
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Associate Professor in Vertebrate Palaeontology, Flinders University
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Honorary Research Associate, Evolutionary Studies Institute, University of the Witwatersrand
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Research Associate in the College of Science and Engineering, Flinders University
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Research Associate, School of Earth and Planetary Sciences, Curtin University
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Professor of Palaeobiology, University of Leicester
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Technical Specialist in Earth Sciences, University of Bristol
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Professor in Geochronology and Geochemistry, Southern Cross University
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Senior Lecturer in Paleontology and Evolutionary Biology, Life Sciences at the University of Bath, University of Bath
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Associate Professor in Ancient DNA, University of Otago
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Lecturer in the School of Applied Sciences, Edinburgh Napier University