Evolution
-
Stark legacy: secrets of dire wolves revealed
Forensic DNA reveals dire wolves are their own species.
If you think dire wolves (Canis dirus) are closely related to other wolves then you know nothing, Jon Snow. A new ...
-
Wolfish thylacines
Skull scans demonstrate example of convergent evolution.
The extinct Tasmanian tiger, or thylacine (Thylacinus cynocephalus), remains one of Australia’s most iconic and myste...
-
Evolutionary link that helped pterosaurs fly
Fossils suggest flightless relative was a middleman.
It’s taking time – in no small part due to the difficulty in finding good evidence – but we’re slowly learning more a...
-
Rethinking the origins of complex life
Studies shift timeline by 100 million years.
Scientists from Australia, Germany, France and the US have shifted the timeline of the origin of complex life, overtu...
-
Well-preserved addition to the evolution story
South African cave throws up another important find.
A two-million-year-old hominin skull has been uncovered in a South African cave, providing fresh insight into the mic...
-
Five eyes and quite a story to tell
Fossil fills gap in the evolution of arthropods.
The fossilised 520-million-year-old creature shown above had five eyes on stalks, but that’s only part of its attract...
-
How pterosaurs flew and what they ate
More insights into the great lizards of the sky.
Two new studies have uncovered details about how pterosaurs – the winged cousins of dinosaurs – evolved to become dea...
-
Signs of change from a turbulent era
Drill core reveals boom-bust landscape in Africa’s Rift Valley.
A new drill core, preserving a million years of environmental history in the East African Rift Valley, is helping unt...
-
Revisiting the question of reptile evolution
Analysis contradicts adaptive radiation theory.
Analysis of a vast database of reptilian information contradicts the theory that major transitions in evolution alway...
-
Mozzies thrive with a gene missing
Unfortunately, another has evolved to do its job.
This may seem hard to believe given their tenacity and constant presence, but mosquitoes lack a gene that is critical...
-
New thoughts on how sharks evolved
Mongolian fossil has a surprisingly bony skull.
This 410-million-year-old fossil with a bony skull uncovered in Mongolia may force a rethink of how sharks evolved. ...
-
Cichlids set the pace in east Africa’s lakes
Discovering the secrets of the fastest evolving species.
Species formation typically happens slowly through new mutations over millions of years, but there are exceptions. ...