New research led by the University of California, Berkeley reveals that beyond Neanderthals and Denisovans, humans interbred with two mysterious ‘ghost’ lineages: one in Africa more than 50,000 years ago, another in Eurasia over 1.7 million years ago.

The post Scientists Find Traces of Two Unknown Archaic Hominins in Human DNA appeared first on Sci.News: Breaking Science News.

A fossilized skull fragment of Homo sp. unearthed in central Spain offers paleoanthropologists a fresh window into the story of ancient humans who lived in Europe hundreds of thousands of years ago.

The post 224,000-Year-Old Homo Skull Fragment Adds New Mystery to Human Origins appeared first on Sci.News: Breaking Science News.

Scientists at the Max Planck Institute for Chemical Ecology have found that moth wings are equipped with odor-detecting receptors, suggesting the insects use their wings -- not just their antennae -- to sense chemical cues in the air while flying.

The post Moths Can Smell With Their Wings, Researchers Say appeared first on Sci.News: Breaking Science News.

Paleontologists have identified the earliest-known cephalopod equipped with a siphuncle -- a tubular extension of the mantle found in shelled cephalopods -- pushing back the fossil record of this key evolutionary feature to the Early Cambrian, roughly 520 million years ago.

The post 520-Million-Year-Old Fossil from China Fills Gap in Evolutionary History of Cephalopods appeared first on Sci.News: Breaking Science News.

The Chicxulub impact not only plunged Earth into an impact winter but also produced a dust blanket that later overheated the planet, according to new research from Purdue University and the University of Colorado, Boulder.

The post Dinosaur-Killing Asteroid Didn’t Just Strike Earth, Its Dust Cloud Cooked It appeared first on Sci.News: Breaking Science News.

Archaeologists in southwestern Germany have unearthed two miniature bird figurines carved from mammoth ivory, among the smallest and most delicate examples of Ice Age art ever found.

The post 40,000-Year-Old Bird Figurines Found in German Cave appeared first on Sci.News: Breaking Science News.

An international team of paleontologists has identified a new species of early sauropodomorph dinosaur in Zimbabwe, adding to growing evidence that southern Africa hosted a richer diversity of dinosaurs during the Late Triassic epoch than previously recognized.

The post New Species of Triassic Dinosaur Discovered on Shores of Zimbabwe’s Lake Kariba appeared first on Sci.News: Breaking Science News.

A new look at more than two decades’ worth of archival data from NASA’s Spirit mission suggests that the Martian soil may hold iron-bearing minerals -- hematite and altered magnetite -- that were too faint for scientists to detect in real time during the mission.

The post Hidden Clues in Spirit Rover Data Suggest Mars Once Had Far More Water than Scientists Realized appeared first on Sci.News: Breaking Science News.

Astronomers have discovered a dormant supermassive black hole 30,000 light-years from the center of WISEA J014656.04-152214.7 -- a massive galaxy located about 750 million light-years away in the constellation of Cetus -- after it briefly lit up by tearing apart a star.

The post Astronomers Spot Wandering Supermassive Black Hole Far From Its Galaxy’s Heart appeared first on Sci.News: Breaking Science News.

A set of 1.43-million-year-old fossil footprints preserved along the margin of an ancient lake in northern Kenya is offering paleoanthropologists new evidence about the size, gait and social lives of the beings who made them and reopening questions about which species they belonged to.

The post Ancient Footprints in Kenya Hint at Bigger Bodies and Group Behavior among Early Human Relatives appeared first on Sci.News: Breaking Science News.

After a century of speculation, astronomers using ESO’s Very Large Telescope (VLT) have captured the clearest evidence yet that the red supergiant Betelgeuse is orbited by a faint companion star.

The post Astronomers Directly Image Betelgeuse’s Long-Suspected Stellar Companion appeared first on Sci.News: Breaking Science News.

A large British study spanning more than 70 years has found that people who experience chronic money struggles over their working lives show measurable declines in memory and processing speed by their 50s, along with signs of accelerated brain shrinkage decades later.

The post Decades of Financial Hardship Linked to Faster Brain Aging appeared first on Sci.News: Breaking Science News.

Paleontologists have announced the discovery of a new fossil honeybee species that fills a long-standing gap in the evolutionary record of the genus Apis.

The post Japanese Fossil Bee Fills Two-Million-Year Gap in Honeybee History appeared first on Sci.News: Breaking Science News.

Adding breakfast back into the daily routine of teens around age 18 who habitually skip the meal can meaningfully improve their nutrition, with the biggest gains seen among those given protein-rich morning meals, according to a six-month clinical trial.

The post New Study Finds Eating Breakfast Boosts Diet Quality in Teens Who Usually Skip It appeared first on Sci.News: Breaking Science News.

A stunning new image captured by the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope shows the lopsided intermediate spiral galaxy NGC 4654, whose unusual shape was sculpted by both a close encounter with another galaxy and a headlong plunge through the hot gas of the Virgo Cluster.

The post Hubble Spots Spiral Galaxy Warped by Cosmic Forces appeared first on Sci.News: Breaking Science News.

Europa’s subsurface ocean has long topped astrobiologists’ wish lists as a place to search for life beyond Earth.

The post Europa’s Ice Shell May Be Tougher Barrier than Planetary Scientists Hoped appeared first on Sci.News: Breaking Science News.

Astronomers using ESO’s Very Large Telescope (VLT) have discovered a gas giant around a brown dwarf in the stellar system CD-35 2722.

The post Planetary-Mass Exomoon Found Circling Brown Dwarf appeared first on Sci.News: Breaking Science News.

Paleontologists at the University of New South Wales have described a new genus and species of dasyurid marsupial from the Early Miocene of Australia, offering the first solid evidence that the family Dasyuridae -- which today includes quolls, Tasmanian devils and tiny antechinuses -- existed long before scientists had proof of it in the fossil record.

The post Early Miocene Fossil Rewrites Family Tree of Little Carnivorous Marsupials appeared first on Sci.News: Breaking Science News.

New 3D computer simulations from ETH Zurich show that young rift flanks on Venus stay tall and steep, while older ones flatten out over time.

The post Giant Rift Valleys Hint Venus is Still Tectonically Active appeared first on Sci.News: Breaking Science News.

Paleontologists have unearthed a remarkably preserved fossil snake in Brazil that is reshaping ideas about how the earliest snakes lived and complicating the long-running debate over whether their ancestors burrowed underground, swam in the sea or crawled the surface.

The post Did Early Snakes Burrow, Swim or Crawl? 80‑Million‑Year‑Old Fossil Suggests: All Three appeared first on Sci.News: Breaking Science News.