Scientists Finally Crack the 100-Million-Year Evolutionary Mystery of Squid and Cuttlefish
Genomic analysis reveals squid and cuttlefish evolved in deep oceans, survived mass extinction in refuges, and later rapidly diversified, following a “long fuse” evolutionary pattern. Squid and cuttle...
Scientists Baffled by Bizarre “Living Fossil” From 275 Million Years Ago
Tanyka amnicola is a newly identified ancient tetrapod known from unusual twisted jawbones adapted for grinding plants. This rare herbivorous “living fossil” helps scientists better understand early e...
Hidden fossils reveal secrets of oceans before major mass extinction
A handful of plankton fossils buried in a small chunk of rock show that the oceans were teeming with life before the Late Ordovician mass extinction, the second most severe on record
35-Million-Year-Old Mystery: Strange Arachnid Discovered Preserved in Amber
A fossil harvestman identified using advanced imaging techniques shows that extinct arachnid lineages once lived in Europe. The discovery expands the known diversity of amber-preserved species in the ...
Cranial anatomy, palaeoneurology, palaeobiology and stratigraphic age of the large-bodied ornithopod, Muttaburrasaurus langdoni Bartholomai and Molnar, 1981, from the mid-Cretaceous of Australia
The holotype of Muttaburrasaurus langdoni Bartholomai & Molnar, 1981, a large-bodied ornithopod from the mid-Cretaceous of Australia, consists of an almost complete skull and partial postcranium, and ...
Oldest octopus fossil is no octopus at all scans reveal.
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The world’s “oldest octopus” was never an octopus
A famous “oldest octopus” fossil has been exposed as a case of mistaken identity. Advanced imaging revealed hidden teeth showing it was actually related to a nautilus, not an octopus. The confusion ca...
'Oldest octopus' fossil is no octopus at all, scans reveal
A famous 300-million-year-old fossil that was thought to be the world's oldest octopus—even featuring in the Guinness Book of Records—has turned out to be something else altogether. In what amounts to...
'Lliving fossils' nautilus and allonautilus shaped by depths and diets over 500 million years
Nautilus and Allonautilus cephalopods and their extinct ancestors have been drifting through the mesophotic zone of the ocean for more than 500 million years. Researchers have spent the last 40 years ...
Tiny 436-Million-Year-Old Fish Fossil Rewrites the Origins of Vertebrates
Ancient fossils from South China reveal the earliest bony fishes and shed new light on how jaws, teeth, and key vertebrate features evolved before the major fish lineages diverged. A research team led...
How we came to be: Scientists get first look at the evolution of early complex animals
Newly discovered fossils have given scientists their first real glimpse of when Earth made a crucial transition from plants and unrecognizably simple animals to the complex creatures that took over th...
Fossil site in China reveals bevy of complex creatures lived prior to the Cambrian explosion, including a 'Dune'-like sandworm
A site in southwestern China holds a wide array of strange life-forms that emerged prior to the Cambrian explosion, and it pushes back the origin of complex life by millions of years.
Engineering the bite of ancient marine predators
An international team of researchers, led by paleontologists of the University of Liège, has investigated the biting capabilities of extinct predatory marine reptiles, revealing how these formidable p...
Ancient bees found nesting inside fossil bones in rare cave discovery
Thousands of years ago in a cave on Hispaniola, an unusual chain of events left behind a rare scientific treasure: bees nesting inside fossilized bones. After giant barn owls repeatedly brought prey l...
Strange “elephant skin” rocks reveal ancient life in the dark ocean
A puzzling wrinkled rock formation in Morocco has led scientists to rethink where ancient microbes could live. Instead of shallow, sunlit waters, these microbes may have thrived deep in the ocean, fue...
This tiny claw in a 500-million-year-old fossil just rewrote the origin of spiders
What started as routine fossil cleaning turned into a major scientific surprise when researchers uncovered a tiny claw in a 500-million-year-old specimen where no claw should exist. That detail reveal...
Homo habilis is the earliest named human. But is it even human?
Between 2 million and 3 million years ago, humans appeared in Africa — but identifying them in the fossil record is turning out to be surprisingly difficult.
Surprise fossil discoveries push back the evolution of complex animals
A fossil bed in China containing animals up to 554 million years old suggests that we may have to reconsider the idea that life suddenly diversified during the Cambrian explosion
Scientists Just Rewrote the Timeline of Complex Life on Earth
Scientists have discovered fossils showing that complex animals existed millions of years before the Cambrian explosion, reshaping the timeline of life on Earth. The finds reveal a strange, diverse ec...
Teenager’s Fossil Find Leads to Discovery of Shark Teeth in 5 Million-Year-Old Whale Skull
Shark teeth found in 5-million-year-old whale skulls provide direct evidence of ancient feeding behavior and predator-prey relationships in the North Sea. Researchers studying two fossilized whale sku...