ancient

A brazier and charred stones, thought to be part of burial ceremonies, preserve signs that people used the drug thousands of years ago.

Archaeologists find ring-shaped objects made from grains at a site in Austria thought to date back to 960 BCE.

Scientists have found traces of the dairy product in 7,200-year-old pottery in Croatia.

New findings cast doubt on previous claims that structures found preserved in rocks in Greenland are stromatolites, but the original authors say the discrepancy lies in different samples.

The oldest-known ice mummy consumed high amounts of fat.

European settlers likely wiped out these ancient dogs, but the animals seem to have left a lasting legacy in a transmissible canine cancer.

Researchers are resurrecting proteins from millions of years ago to understand evolution and lay the groundwork for bioengineering custom molecules.

How to analyze ancient proteins

The ancient human may have lived around 200,000 to 300,000 years ago—much more recently than previously estimated.

Nuclear DNA from 430,000-year-old specimens indicates that Neanderthals had already diverged from their ancient-human predecessors.

Researchers find the oldest and largest crocodile relative yet discovered.

Antarctic moss beds that have been frozen for more than 1,500 years yield plants that can be brought back to life in the lab.

Bacterial genes aid tubeworm settling; pigmentation of ancient reptiles; nascent neurons and vertebrate development; exploring simple synapses; slug-inspired surgical glue

The chipmunk-sized Rugosodon eurasiaticus is the oldest representative of a prolific and long-lasting mammalian lineage.

A reexamination of the facts surrounding the death of Cleopatra VII reveals that the Egyptian queen was murdered—and not by an asp.

In Chapter 1, “The Coldest Case,” author and criminal profiler Pat Brown sets the scene for her quest to prove that the Egyptian queen did not commit suicide.

By analyzing a collection of 24 genetic variations, researchers are able to predict the hair and eye color of long-dead humans.

Fossils from northern Kenya point to a new human species that lived in Africa nearly 2 million years ago.