Ancestry & Evolution
The desire to understand our origins is primal. By examining our DNA over successive generations through the evolutionary process of inherited characteristics of human and animal populations–as well as from those species from which humans share a common ancestry–we can decipher our individual and collective past and develop medical innovations for the future.
Below is the complete archive of related articles sorted by date.
From dinosaur to bird: How did the transformation take place?
[I]n Bavaria, the Jurassic-aged limestone deposits yielded a near-perfect fossil of Archaeopteryx. It had blade-like serrated teeth and many other features ...
98: That’s how many humans it would take to start over on another planet
Are we too vulnerable to asteroid strikes and other cataclysms to stick with our single planet? … Frédéric Marin is ...
‘Zombie gene’ could explain why elephants rarely get cancer
[B]igger animals, which have more cells, should have greater occurrences of cancer. By that reasoning, elephants, with hundreds of times ...
‘Remarkable’ love child: Here’s what happened when a Neanderthal met a Denisovan
In a remarkable twist in the story line of early human evolution, scientists have announced the discovery of “Denisova 11”—a ...
Viewpoint: Here’s why it’s ‘moronic’ to suggest that Homo erectus was lazy
[Y]ou’ve probably seen a headline or two (or twelve) touting a new discovery about our long extinct human relative, Homo erectus ...
Alpha: Examining Hollywood’s tale of dog domestication
Long ago, before your four-legged best friend learned to fetch tennis balls or watch football from the couch, his ancestors ...
Did laziness drive early human relative, Homo erectus, to extinction?
Homo erectus may have gone extinct because they were lazy, according to research from the Australian National University. Scientists claim ...
Are mental disorders linked to the tweaking of genes in human evolution?
The same recent evolutionary changes that make humans prone to bad backs and impacted wisdom teeth may also tweak genes ...
Ancient genetic oddity makes whales and other aquatic mammals deadly susceptible to common pesticides
Over the past 50 million years, a group of small, hoofed mammals gradually evolved into today’s whales and dolphins. In ...
Were there two migration routes into North America? Genetics meets archaeology
Popular accounts of the peopling of North America paint a picture of a lone long-ago trek across the Bering Land ...
Why other primates can’t talk: It’s all in the brain
Compared to humans, most primates produce a limited range of vocalizations: At one end of the spectrum, there’s the Calabar angwantibo, ...
Talking Biotech: Chicken is the most widely grown animal in the world, but where did this popular bird come from?
Chicken is essential to modern agriculture, but where did it come from? Oxford University's Dr. Greger Larson explores this popular ...
What are the odds that aliens might actually look similar to us?
In his new book, Equations of Life: How Physics Shapes Evolution, Charles Cockell from the University of Edinburgh makes the argument ...
Delving into our 10 million-year relationship with booze
It was conventional wisdom that the human love affair with alcohol began 10,000 years ago, with the invention of agriculture ...
Tamed foxes could help unravel complex genetics behind social behavior
[D]omestication, based purely on behavioral traits, can result in other changes — like curlier tails and changes to fur color ...
Challenging our understanding of the genetics behind the evolution of human language
The evolution of human language was once thought to have hinged on changes to a single gene that were so ...
No link found between Flores Island pygmies and ancient ‘hobbits’ in study
Geneticist Serena Tucci sat in the small Indonesian village of Rampasasa on Flores Island, the only woman in a room full of ...
Can we learn about ourselves by studying chimpanzees? Not really.
Trying to go back to our animal roots sounds good in theory, but we can't truly find out what it ...
Jack of all environments: Is this why Homo sapiens survived and thrived?
When paleoanthropologists and archaeologists define what makes our species unique, they usually focus on our use of symbolism and language, ...
Ancient worms resurrected after spending more than 32,000 years on ice
A team of Russian scientists is lining themselves up to be the opening cast of a John Carpenter film. Earlier ...
We talk to our dogs. Do they understand the words we use?
Dogs know what 'get the ball' means, but do they truly understand what we say? ...
Paleocolor: What did dinosaurs look like? Shining a light on their true colors could illuminate behavior
Long thought an impossible dream, the emerging field of palaeocolour is revolutionising our view of the prehistoric world, turning it from black-and-white ...
Here’s why we now believe Neanderthals were able to create fire
New research shows that Neanderthals were able to start fires using stone tools. The findings, published in the journal Scientific Reports, present ...
Uncovering ancient human footprints left on world’s coastlines
When preserved, footprints are a library of clues about a human’s activities, speed of travel, height, weight, and sometimes even ...
Authenticity of Romanov remains confirmed through DNA analysis
Today [July 17] marks the 100th anniversary of the execution of Nicholas II and his family, an event that toppled ...
Remnants of ancient society found in Ecuador’s cloud forest
In the 1850s, a team of botanists venturing into the cloud forest in the Quijos Valley of eastern Ecuador hacked their way ...
Nimble human fingers evolved to smash animal bones in search for marrow
Scientists have long linked the evolution of the human hand—unique for its lengthy opposable thumbs and dexterous fingers—to the rise ...
