Archaeology
When we were prey
Bite marks on a 2-million-year-old human jaw suggest leopards once hunted people as prey. People likely survived by learning to team up.
Fossils
More Stories in Fossils
- Animals
Giant school bus–sized octopuses may have once ruled the oceans
Some of these predators were as long as whales. Roaming the seas more than 72 million years ago, the octopuses appear to have been the largest invertebrates ever known.
- Animals
The dawn of animal evolution saw a bizarre array of sea creatures
Newfound fossils turned up a strange zoo of often-complex creatures, including some suggesting that evolution of left-right symmetry occurred earlier than once though.
- Life
Looking for LUCA, everyone’s shared ancestor
You and all other living things descended from a single organism — our great-grand-germ. Scientists are studying modern genes to learn more about this very distant ancestor.
- Life
After the dino-killer asteroid, life bounced back quickly
New ocean dwellers arrived millennia — maybe decades — after the Chicxulub impact. That forces a rethink of evolution's response to wipeout events.
- Fossils
Fossil vomit shows what one 290-million-year-old predator dined on
Bones in the barfed-up material, which dates to a time before the dinosaurs, offer a rare peek into the diet of a prehistoric hunter.
- Fossils
Prehistoric ‘sea’ monster also lurked in rivers, data show
A 66-million-year-old fossil tooth turned up alongside remains of a T. rex and ancient crocodile. This shows some mosasaurs roamed into rivers.
- Fossils
Let’s learn about Tyrannosaurus rex
These fearsome predators truly were enormous — with the bone-crushing bite power to match.
- Animals
Chicago’s Rat Hole? Science concludes it’s likely not from a rat
Researchers employed tools of paleontology to analyze the iconic landmark — a sidewalk critter crater made when a mystery rodent fell into wet concrete.
- Fossils
Here’s why ammolite gems have a rainbow shimmer
The fossils’ fabulous colors arise from delicate assemblies of crystal plates.
