All articles tagged with #pleistocene
The honey locust (Gleditsia triacanthos) bears massive thorns up to 20 cm long that likely evolved to deter Pleistocene megafauna; while these spikes can cause painful puncture wounds and infections, the tree is valued for its dense timber and is invasive in places like Australia, though reports of human injuries remain rare.
A 700,000-year-old DNA analysis of fossilized coprolites from the Klondike region reveals that after torpor, ancient ground squirrels ate a diverse diet including megafauna such as woolly mammoths, bison and big cats, and it uncovers a previously unknown ground-squirrel lineage along with what may be the oldest mammoth DNA.
Europe-wide researchers drilled a 2.8-km Antarctic ice core to produce the longest continuous climate record, about 1.2 million years, showing atmospheric CO2 closely tracking global temperatures across repeated cycles and offering new clues to why ice ages intensified during the Mid-Pleistocene transition. The Beyond EPICA findings—presented at the European Geosciences Union meeting—are early results, not yet peer‑reviewed, with more data to come from the ancient air bubbles trapped in the ice.
Pronghorns survived deep-time climate upheavals in North America through rapid reproduction, a drought-tolerant diet, and predator shifts, but today they face habitat fragmentation, warmer temperatures, drought and wildfires in the West—lessons in adaptation that humans may need to heed as climate change accelerates.
Fossilized human footprints dating back 115,000 years were discovered in Saudi Arabia's Nefud Desert, providing the earliest direct evidence of Homo sapiens in the region, likely made during a brief period when the area supported a freshwater lake and diverse wildlife, indicating early human movement and behavior in a now-arid landscape.
New discoveries along Portugal's Algarve coast have revealed the first fossilized Neanderthal footprints in the region, dating back around 78,000 to 82,000 years. These footprints provide direct evidence of Neanderthal behavior, movement, and social structure, indicating they explored coastal environments and had a diverse diet including deer, horses, and marine resources. This challenges previous ideas about Neanderthal ecology and highlights their adaptability to coastal habitats.
A groundbreaking discovery in South Africa includes the first fossilized hyrax butt-drag trace and associated deposits like coprolites and hyraceum, providing new insights into ancient hyrax behavior and environment during the Pleistocene epoch.
A mitochondrial DNA study reveals at least two waves of migration from Asia to the Americas, with early migrations occurring during the last Ice Age via the Pacific coast rather than the Bering Land Bridge, and genetic links also connecting Native Americans, China, and Japan, including contributions to the Japanese Ainu gene pool.
A study found evidence of lead exposure in the teeth of hominins dating back nearly 2 million years, suggesting that lead poisoning is an ancient issue that may have influenced human evolution, with environmental sources like natural minerals and wildfires contributing to exposure.
Scientists have recovered 200,000-year-old DNA from horse remains at the open-air Schöningen site in Germany, challenging previous assumptions that such genetic material could only survive in cold or sheltered environments. The DNA belongs to an extinct horse species, Equus mosbachensis, and provides new insights into ancient horse lineages and early human hunting practices. This discovery suggests that ancient DNA can be preserved in less protected environments, opening new avenues for archaeological genetic research.
Researchers have discovered the first fossilized hyrax butt-drag impression, dating back around 126,000 years, along with other traces like tracks and deposits of fossilized dung and urine, providing new insights into ancient animal behavior and environments during the Pleistocene epoch.
A new study analyzing mitochondrial DNA from mammoth fossils in Mexico reveals a distinct and divergent lineage of Columbian mammoths, suggesting complex evolutionary history and coexistence of different lineages during the Late Pleistocene, highlighting the importance of broader geographic genomic data in understanding extinct species.
Scientists discovered a 12,000-year-old human skeleton in Vietnam with a quartz projectile injury, possibly indicating early conflict among hunter-gatherers, and the find includes the oldest mitochondrial DNA from the region, offering rare insights into early human life and violence.
Fossilized teeth from the Hualongdong site in China reveal a complex mix of primitive and modern human traits over 300,000 years ago, challenging traditional views of linear human evolution in Asia and suggesting a diverse and intricate evolutionary history.
Archaeological findings from a cave on South Africa’s coast reveal insights into human life during the last Ice Age, including tool use, migration, and social connections, highlighting the complexity and adaptability of early humans in a changing environment.