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UrduCamelina, also known as false flax or Gold-of-Pleasure, is an ancient oilseed crop with emerging applications in the production of sustainable, low-input biofuels. Multidisciplinary research from Washington University in St. Louis is revealing the origins and uses of camelina and may help guide decisions critical to achieving its potential as a biofuel feedstock for a greener aviation industry in the future.
Tag: OLD WORLD
Archaeology: Roman road discovered in the Venice lagoon
The discovery of a Roman road submerged in the Venice Lagoon is reported in Scientific Reports this week. The findings suggest that extensive settlements may have been present in the Venice Lagoon centuries before the founding of Venice began in…
Study highlights need to replace ‘ancestry’ in forensics with something more accurate
A new study finds forensics researchers use terms related to ancestry and race in inconsistent ways, and calls for the discipline to adopt a new approach to better account for both the fluidity of populations and how historical events have…
Ancient ostrich eggshell reveals new evidence of extreme climate change thousands of years ago
Evidence from an ancient eggshell has revealed important new information about the extreme climate change faced by human early ancestors. The research shows parts of the interior of South Africa that today are dry and sparsely populated, were once wetland…
CWRU receives $1.2M W.M. Keck Foundation grant to determine ecological factors affect the evolution of our ancestors
Professor Beverly Saylor leads interdisciplinary global group applying state-of-the art technology to answer ancient questions
Wallonia as an international reference for the timeline
Paleontologists from Univeristy of Liège (Belgium) redefine the geological boundary between the Devonian and Carboniferous periods. A Walloon site could be chosen as a world reference for this boundary.
New fossil discovery from Israel points to complicated evolutionary process
BINGHAMTON, N.Y. — Analysis of recently discovered fossils found in Israel suggest that interactions between different human species were more complex than previously believed, according to a team of researchers including Binghamton University anthropology professor Rolf Quam. The research team,…
New findings unveil a missing piece of human prehistory
A joint research team led by Prof. FU Qiaomei from the Institute of Vertebrate Paleontology and Paleoanthropology (IVPP) of the Chinese Academy of Sciences sequenced the ancient genomes of 31 individuals from southern East Asia, thus unveiling a missing piece…
Tiny ancient bird from China shares skull features with Tyrannosaurus rex
Researchers from the Institute of Vertebrate Paleontology and Paleoanthropology (IVPP) of the Chinese Academy of Sciences have discovered a 120-million-year-old partial fossil skeleton of a tiny extinct bird that fits in the palm of the hand and preserves a unique…
Bronze Age Scandinavia’s trading networks for copper settled
Crossing the North Sea before crossing the Alps!
New discovery shows Tibet as crossroads for giant rhino dispersal
The giant rhino, Paraceratherium , is considered the largest land mammal that ever lived and was mainly found in Asia, especially China, Mongolia, Kazakhstan, and Pakistan. How this genus dispersed across Asia was long a mystery, however. A new discovery…
Ten years of ancient genome analysis has taught scientists ‘what it means to be human’
A ball of 4,000-year-old hair frozen in time tangled around a whalebone comb led to the first ever reconstruction of an ancient human genome just over a decade ago
At underwater site, research team finds 9,000-year-old stone artifacts
Underwater archaeology team finds ancient obsidian flakes 2,000 miles from quarry
Sealed, signed and delivered
Hebrew University archaeologists unveil 7,000-year-old seal impressions used for commerce and protection of property
Indigenous mortality following Spanish colonization did not always lead to forest regrowth
A new study, published now in Nature Ecology and Evolution , draws on pollen records from tropical regions formerly claimed by the Spanish Empire in both the Atlantic and the Pacific, to test the significance and extent of forest regrowth…
Discovery of the oldest plant fossils on the African continent!
A new study describes a particularly diverse fossil flora from 400 million year ago.
Ancient chickens lived significantly longer than modern fowl because they were seen as sacred, not food — study shows
Ancient chickens lived significantly longer than their modern equivalents because they were seen as sacred – not food – archaeologists have found. Experts have developed the first reliable method of finding the age of fowl who lived thousands of years…
Stone Age raves to the beat of elk tooth rattles?
“Ornaments composed of elk teeth suspended from or sown on to clothing emit a loud rattling noise when moving,” says auditory archaeologist and Academy of Finland Research Fellow Riitta Rainio from the University of Helsinki. “Wearing such rattlers while dancing…
Researchers figured out how the ancestors of modern horses migrated
Molecular biologists studied the DNA of ones that migrated from North America to Eurasia and back
Newly discovered African ‘climate seesaw’ drove human evolution
While it is widely accepted that climate change drove the evolution of our species in Africa, the exact character of that climate change and its impacts are not well understood. Glacial-interglacial cycles strongly impact patterns of climate change in many…
A non-invasive procedure allows obtaining archaeological information without excavating
The research, led by members of the CaSEs research group and published in PLOS ONE, represents the first application of pXRF (portable X-ray fluorescence analysis), combined with geostatistical data analysis, to anthropogenic sediments in Africa.
Study sheds light on population history of northern east Asia
A study led by research groups of Prof. FU Qiaomei from the Institute of Vertebrate Paleontology and Paleoanthropology (IVPP) of the Chinese Academy of Sciences and Prof. ZHANG Hucai from Yunnan University covers the largest temporal transect of population dynamics…
Dinosaur-age fossils provide new insights into origin of flowering plants
Flowering plants (angiosperms) dominate most terrestrial ecosystems, providing the bulk of human food. However, their origin has been a mystery since the earliest days of evolutionary thought. Angiosperm flowers are hugely diverse. The key to clarifying the origin of flowers…
Ancient fish bones reveal non-kosher diet of ancient Judeans, say researchers
Ancient Judeans commonly ate non-kosher fish surrounding the time that such food was prohibited in the Bible, suggests a study published in the peer-reviewed journal Tel Aviv . This finding sheds new light on the origin of Old Testament dietary…
Forensic archaeologists begin to recover Spanish Civil War missing bodies
Forensic archaeologists and anthropologists from Cranfield University have started to recover the bodies of victims executed by the Franco regime at the end of the Spanish Civil War during an excavation in the Ciudad Real region of Spain. The team…
Biodiversity devastation: Human-driven decline requires millions of years of recovery
A new study shows that the current rate of biodiversity decline in freshwater ecosystems outcompetes that at the end-Cretaceous extinction that killed the dinosaurs: damage now being done in decades to centuries may take millions of years to undo. The…
Provenance: How an object’s origin can facilitate authentic, inclusive storytelling
Archivists assess, collect and preserve various artifacts and archive them to better understand their origin and cultural heritage.
The entire genome from Peştera Muierii 1 sequenced
For the first time, researchers have successfully sequenced the entire genome from the skull of Peştera Muierii 1, a woman who lived in today’s Romania 35,000 years ago. Her high genetic diversity shows that the out of Africa migration was…
Newly discovered miocene biome sheds light on rainforest evolution
An international research group led by Prof. WANG Bo and Prof. SHI Gongle from the Nanjing Institute of Geology and Palaeontology of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (NIGPAS) collected approximately 25,000 fossil-containing amber samples and about 5,000 fossil plants in…
New results about the diets of people who lived on the Great Hungarian Plain
A transdisciplinary study of the dietary evolution of the first agricultural and pastoral communities in Central Europe
Scientists uncover the last meal of a cretaceous pollinator
While pollinators such as bees and butterflies provide crucial ecosystem services today, little is known about the origin of the intimate association between flowering plants and insects. Now, a new amber fossil unearthed by researchers from the Nanjing Institute of…
Early humans in the Kalahari were as innovative as their coastal neighbours
Archaeological evidence in a rockshelter at the edge of the Kalahari Desert, South Africa, is challenging the idea that the origins of our species were linked to coastal environments
Modern analysis of rock art
Machine learning opens new doors in archaeology
Increased precipitation and the watery miracles of Italian saints
A new study published in the journal Climatic Change examines the cultural impacts of climate change in Italy during the first millennium AD
Ancient genomes trace the origin and decline of the Scythians
Because of their interactions and conflicts with the major contemporaneous civilizations of Eurasia, the Scythians enjoy a legendary status in historiography and popular culture. The Scythians had major influences on the cultures of their powerful neighbors, spreading new technologies such…
Warriors’ down bedding could ease journey to realm of the dead
This may well be the most interesting story about pillows and bedding you will ever read
The world’s earliest stone technologies are likely to be older than previously thought
A new study from the University of Kent’s School of Anthropology and Conservation has found that Oldowan and Acheulean stone tool technologies are likely to be tens of thousands of years older than current evidence suggests.
Towards a better understanding of societal responses to climate change
Scholars of archaeology, geography, history and paleoclimatology lay out a new framework for uncovering climate-society interactions
Ancient bone artefact found
Archaeologists describe rare Lower Murray find
Experts recreate a mechanical Cosmos for the world’s first computer
Researchers at UCL have solved a major piece of the puzzle that makes up the ancient Greek astronomical calculator known as the Antikythera Mechanism, a hand-powered mechanical device that was used to predict astronomical events. Known to many as the…
Fossils from “Vegetational Pompeii” Resolve Deep Palaeontology Mystery
A recent study on spectacular fossil plants preserved in a volcanic ash fall deposit–known as China’s “vegetational Pompeii,” in Inner Mongolia, China–has resolved a mystery that puzzled palaeontology for over a century: What are Noeggerathiales? The study, published in PNAS…
Extracting information from ancient teeth
There’s a surprising amount of information stored in the hardened plaque, or calculus, between teeth. And if that calculus belongs to the remains of a person who lived in ancient times, the information could reveal new insights about the past.…
Ancient group once considered nomadic stayed local
Images As far back as the Greek historian Herodotus, a group of people called the Scythians were considered highly mobile warrior nomads. Scythian-era people lived across Eurasia from about 700 BCE to 200 BCE, and have long been considered highly…
Researchers solve more of the mystery of Laos megalithic jars
‘Plain of Jars’ dates put at 1240 to 660 BCE
Fossil lamprey larvae overturn textbook assumptions on vertebrate origins
Study shows studies of the origin of vertebrates – including human – were based on incorrect assumptions since the late 1800s
Research reveals oldest documented site of indiscriminate mass killing
In previous research, ancient massacre sites found men who died while pitted in battle or discovered executions of targeted families. At other sites, evidence showed killing of members of a migrant community in conflict with previously established communities, and even…
Woolly mammoths may have shared the landscape with first humans in New England
Researchers trace the age of a rib fragment of the Mount Holly mammoth
Prehistoric killing machine exposed
Previously thought of as heavy, slow and sluggish, the 260-million-year-old predator, Anteosaurus, was a ferocious hunter-killer
New technology allows scientists first glimpse of intricate details of Little Foot’s life
In June 2019, an international team brought the complete skull of the 3.67-million-year-old Little Foot Australopithecus skeleton, from South Africa to the UK and achieved unprecedented imaging resolution of its bony structures and dentition in an X-ray synchrotron-based investigation at…
Deep dive into bioarchaeological data reveals Mediterranean migration trends over 8,000 years
A team of international researchers led by a Florida State University assistant professor has analyzed reams of data from the Neolithic to Late Roman period looking at migration patterns across the Mediterranean and found that despite evidence of cultural connections,…