Tag: Paleoanthropology
News Bite: Cosmic rays date ancient human ancestor
Dating fossils might sound like Saturday night for a paleontologist, but it’s serious science! In a new study, a group of physicists and paleontologists teamed up to re-date one of the most complete skeletons of a human relative ever discovered. The skeleton was discovered in a cave in South Africa twenty years ago, but the geology of the cave made it tough to figure out how long ago the animal, n …
Filed under: Africa, Australopithecus, Cenozoic, Fossils, Geology, Hominids, Hominins, Human ancestors, Human evolution, New methods, Paleoanthropology, Paleontology, Paranthropus, Pliocene, Purdue University, South Africa
Episode 10 Field Guide: The Hobbit – An Unexpected Discovery
Hobbits! Dragons! Weird elephants and ancient mysteries! It’s the stuff of literary and box office gold. And it turns out it’s the stuff of prehistory, too! In 2004 a group of paleontologists working on the island of Flores, a part of the Indonesian archipelago, discovered the bones of small people in a cave called Liang Bua. The bones represented several individuals that were only 3’ 6” tall (A l …
Filed under: Africa, Asia, Biogeography, Cenozoic, Field Guide, Flores, Fossils, Homo erectus, Human evolution, Indonesia, Lord of the Rings, Mammals, Paleoanthropology, Paleontology, Pleistocene, hobbit, human
