ScienceDaily: Fossils & Ruins News


Icebergs drifting from Canada to southern Florida

Posted: 16 Jun 2021 11:32 AM PDT

Climate modelers have found evidence that massive icebergs from roughly 31,000 years ago drifted more than 5,000km (> 3,000 miles) along the eastern United States coast from Northeast Canada all the way to southern Florida.

Light in darkness: An experimental look at Paleolithic cave lighting

Posted: 16 Jun 2021 11:30 AM PDT

A recreation of three common types of Paleolithic lighting systems (torches, grease lamps, and fireplaces) illuminates how Paleolithic cave dwellers might have traveled, lived, and created in the depths of their caves, according to a new study.

Ten years of ancient genome analysis has taught scientists 'what it means to be human'

Posted: 16 Jun 2021 08:38 AM PDT

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 a decade ago. The hair, which was preserved in arctic permafrost in Greenland, was collected in the 1980s. It wasn't until 2010 that evolutionary biologists were able to use pioneering shotgun DNA sequencing to reconstruct the genetic history of the hair. It sparked a 'decade of discovery.'

At underwater site, research team finds 9,000-year-old stone artifacts

Posted: 16 Jun 2021 06:41 AM PDT

Underwater archaeologists have been studying 9,000-year-old stone tool artifacts discovered in Lake Huron that originated from an obsidian quarry more than 2,000 miles away in central Oregon. The obsidian flakes from the underwater archaeological site represent the oldest and farthest east confirmed specimens of western obsidian ever found in the continental United States.

Fossil research shows woodlice cousins roamed Ireland 360 million years ago

Posted: 16 Jun 2021 06:38 AM PDT

The old cousins of the common woodlice were crawling on Irish land as long as 360 million years ago, according to new analysis of a fossil found in Kilkenny, Ireland.