News Desk

A recent small study analyzes how the psychedelic drug LSD reshapes brain activity. The research shows that the substance boosts widespread neural synchronization while blurring the boundaries between sensory perception and abstract thought. The findings were published in PLOS Computational Biology.

While the possibility that dark matter exists in an extra, hidden dimension has been extensively researched in recent years, scientists at the University of Sheffield have now taken that concept a step further. A new study, published in Physical Review D, proposes a framework to explain how dark matter behaves and why it remains so difficult to detect.

For 65m years, this landscape has sheltered all manner of astonishing creatures. But some of the most fascinating life forms found here are even older. Before animals walked the Earth or trees began converting carbon dioxide into oxygen, fungi helped to create the conditions necessary for complex life on our planet. “People often say that fungi grow in the forest,” Dr Alison Pouliot, a mycologist, tells me as we inhale cool air perfumed with the gentle spice of sassafras. “But there wouldn’t be a forest without fungi. Fungi are the ecosystem engineers that created the foundation for the forest.”

Research published on Thursday has revealed that the humble birds were first domesticated 3,500 years ago, meaning they have been enmeshed in our lives for nearly a millennium longer than previously thought.

Neandertal babies seem to have started life much the same as modern humans, then grew a lot faster…One study, published June 17 in Royal Society Open Science, looked at the remains of a very young Neandertal child. The other study, published April 15 in Current Biology, examined the remains of a six-month-old Neandertal from a cave in northern Israel.

In an anthropology-expanding study published in Nature Communications, an international team reports that human DNA can be preserved on cave walls for millennia.

A microscopic analysis of the skull of Qafzeh 25 revealed a cut mark likely made by a stone tool 100,000 years ago. The study was published June 30 in the journal Scientific Reports.

The authors of a new study published in iScience propose that cephalopods may be evidence that something else is the dominant driver of brain size.

A hidden ring of stones or timbers detected beneath peat at Machrie Moor could represent a previously unknown Neolithic or Bronze Age monument.

Tens of thousands of years ago, Homo sapiens coexisted with Neanderthals, Homo neanderthalensis. Many of us living today carry a small amount of Neanderthal DNA, indicating that the two species may have shared much more than just the same land. Now, a breakthrough archaeological discovery has revealed that the two species did not merely cross paths: they possibly shared a common culture that spanned more than 20,000 years. The paper is published in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

At first, 15 individuals were found inside the Rising Star cave system. Now, archaeologists have specimens of at least 20 of these ancient humans, who lived between 236,000 and 335,000 years ago. A new examination of the ancient proteins preserved in their teeth suggests that the site is surprisingly lacking in males and may even be an all-female site. The research was published in Cell.

The discovery was made near the Giant’s Ring, just outside Belfast, during a community archaeology excavation led by Brian Sloan from Queen’s University. The site came to the team’s attention after they saw aerial photography highlighting several crop marks that extended farther than previously thought.

Roughly 27,500 years ago, a 15-year-old boy was brutally mauled by a bear in Arene Candide in what is now Liguria, Italy. The attack tore through his jaw, neck and left shoulder. He was dying, but he was not alone in his final moments.

The long-held idea that rainforests held a minor role in our species’ evolution is changing — and our ability to adapt to these tropical areas may give insight about ‘what it means to be uniquely human.’

Curtin University researchers use innovative techniques to date three-billion-year-old impact crater in Western Australia’s Pilbara region. They are publishing their findings in the Geology journal.

A new study, published in Quaternary Science Reviews, challenges long-held assumptions about how prehistoric hunter-gatherers survived in the Southern Caucasus between 57,000 and 27,000 years ago.