From epic poetry to game shows, from Stone Age axes to spaceflight, humans have the most complex cultures of any species on Earth. Since the time of Darwin, scientists have suspected that this culture ...

When scientists found the skull, named Yunxian 2, they assumed it belonged to an earlier ancestor of ours, Homo erectus, the first large-brained humans. That's because it dated back about a million ...

Two small changes in human DNA may have played a big role in helping our ancestors walk upright, researchers say.

The discovery of chemical signatures of lead in hominid fossils challenges our understanding of ancient environmental ...

Lead is a powerful neurotoxin that disrupts the growth and function of both brain and body. There is no safe level of lead exposure, and even the smallest traces can impair memory, learning and ...

Human evolution is a story writ slow. It’s been about 3.8 billion years since life on Earth emerged and steadily began to ...

Researchers analysed 2 million-year-old Paranthropus robustus teeth from South Africa, uncovering ancient proteins that ...

What will humans be like generations from now in a world transformed by artificial intelligence (AI)? Plenty of thinkers have applied themselves to questions like this, considering how AI will alter ...

Autism spectrum disorder (ASD) may be the result of millions of years of evolution. Rapid neuronal evolution in humans is likely ASD’s genetic cause, new research suggests. Though autism can cause ...

A reconstruction of the crushed skull labelled Yunxian 2, which has features that are closer to species thought to have existed later in human evolution - BBC A digital reconstruction of a ...