All Stories by Bruce Bower
- Humans
Slicing meat may have aided human evolution
An experiment with modern-day humans shows how slicing meat could have saved human ancestors energy — and let their bodies and brains get bigger.
- Humans
News Brief: Ancient teeth point to Neandertal relatives
New analyses of some teeth found in Siberia indicate that Neandertal cousins known as Denisovans lived there for at least 60,000 years. That would have had them around the same place as modern humans — and at nearly the same time.
- Genetics
The earliest evidence of plague
Plague is best known as the killer disease that wiped out nearly half of Europe during the 1300s. But the germ infected people up to 3,000 years earlier than that, DNA from ancient teeth now show.
- Humans
Bronze Age mummies unearthed in Great Britain
Bronze Age communities from southern England to Scotland appear to mummified their dead. Tests show this occurred between roughly 3,000 and 4,000 years ago.
- Fossils
Fossils: Is this new species a human relative?
Fossils found in an underground cave in South Africa may be from a previously unknown species of the human genus, Homo.
- Humans
Picture This: ‘Super-henge’ buried near Stonehenge
Scientists using ground-penetrating radar discovered a massive stone monument, now buried, at a prehistoric village near Stonehenge.
- Humans
Jamestown: Unearthed graves tell tales of colony leaders
The newly uncovered 400-year-old remains of four leaders of the Jamestown settlement in Virginia reveal details of the notable’s lives — and deaths.
- Fossils
Remains of ancient primate found in Oregon
Scientists have found a few teeth and a fossil jaw of an ancient species of primate. It may be related to modern lemurs or tarsiers.
- Fossils
Fossil find adds a relative to our family tree
Lucy is the best known of our early ancestors. Now, a new fossil from Ethiopia suggests a second pre-human species lived alongside her kind.
- Fossils
Ritual cannibalism occurred in Stone Age England
Stone Age human bones from a cave in England show signs of cannibalism. The people had been eaten during burial rituals nearly 15,000 years ago, experts say.
- Humans
Neandertals create oldest jewelry in Europe
Adorned with all-natural signs of power: eagle claws. Holes in these claws show that Neandertals had been strung them together, like beads, as jewelry.
- Fossils
Newly dated footprints: Oldest human tracks?
These footprints, found nearly a half-century ago, may be almost four times older than first thought, scientists now report.
