Ancient DNA is turning human prehistory into something startlingly intimate. Instead of a clean handoff from one species to another, the last 50,000 years look more like a long, tangled story of ...

The discovery of ancient human cousins has long stirred wonder and debate. Early Neanderthal remains offered a glimpse into our distant past, prompting questions about how they lived and whether they ...

Every face carries a story, shaped long before birth by a quiet choreography of genes switching on and off at just the right moment. A new study suggests that part of that story reaches far back into ...

A gene called ADSL, which helps synthesize DNA, differs between modern humans and our extinct human relatives. The findings could shed light on why Neanderthals vanished. When you purchase through ...

Modern humans are evolutionary survivors, thriving generation after generation while our ancient relatives died out. Now, new research into our brain chemistry suggests that an enzyme unique to Homo ...

In a spectacular bit of science, a group of scientists has sequenced the DNA from the femur of a man who died 45,000 years ago. The femur they studied is over 20 times older than this 2000 year old ...

Demography relating known and proposed archaic lineages to modern human populations. (A) Basic demographic model with CSFS fit. W Afr, West Africans; Eur, European; N, Neanderthal; D, Denisovan; UA, ...

The Jomon people living in prehistoric Japan had "little to no" Denisovan DNA, suggesting their ancestors may not have been in contact with this now-extinct group of Eurasian humans, a new study ...