Making Fire, Ancient Humans
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While keeping the long-dead crocodilian intact, McKnight and her team also “virtually” recreated the bronze hook lodged in the specimen’s stomach for future museum displays. McKnight says that in the past Ancient Egyptians likely used hardened clay to create a mold and then poured molten metal over a charcoal fire to create the hook.
Climate Compass on MSN
How scientists are using ancient ice cores to predict future climates
Frozen deep beneath Antarctica and Greenland lies something remarkable. Tiny bubbles of ancient air, locked away in ice for hundreds of thousands of years, hold secrets about our planet's past. Scientists are now racing to extract these icy time capsules before they melt away forever,
Scientists from Arizona State University and other institutions finally assigned a species name to a fossil known as the Burtele foot. The discovery was made in 2009 at a site in Ethiopia.
The ancient world was probably filled with magicians using science only a few understood, but the works of one man have survived the passage of time.
million-year-old fossils revealed that this species began to diversify millions of years earlier than previously thought, starting with changes in its bite.
Scientists excavating the ruins of Pompeii have discovered a construction site left frozen in time by the eruption of Italy's Mount Vesuvius volcano in 79 AD, clarifying the ingredients and methods behind the durable self-healing concrete the ancient Romans used to revolutionize architecture.
Scientists have uncovered evidence of a colossal shark that lived off northern Australia about 115 million years ago, revealing that modern shark lineages grew to immense sizes far earlier than expected.
As far as kitchen staples, you don’t really get much better than olive oil. It can do it all—jazz up a salad, sauté vegetables, add a nice crisp to some noodles, and more. Humans have been using olive oil for about 8,000 years, so archeologists often report olive oil residue on excavated pottery.
Around 120 million years ago, a bird swallowed over 800 tiny stones and choked to death as a result. Paleontologists aren’t sure why. Like many recent fossil “discoveries,” researchers with the Field Museum were browsing through a collection of old fossils when they noticed something that appeared to be an entirely new species.
Scientists are uncovering signs that Earth has been hit by powerful cosmic blasts that leave little trace on the surface yet unleash extraordinary heat and pressure.