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human evolution

Common Octopus

Life

Octopuses prompt rethink of why animals evolve big brains

A popular idea suggests a link between big brains and a rich social life, but octopuses don't fit the pattern, which suggests something else is going on

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Humans

Hominin fossils from Morocco may be close ancestors of modern humans

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Life

Jellyfish sleep about as much as humans do – and nap like us too

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Sahelanthropus tchadensis, a Miocene ape

Humans

Was our earliest ancestor a knuckle-dragger, or did it walk upright?

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Green DNA with trees

Life

Human-plant hybrid cells reveal truth about dark DNA in our genome

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Humans

2025 was chock full of exciting discoveries in human evolution

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A polar bear grizzly bear hybrid , Ursus maritimus, t

Life

What the family drama of interbreeding polar and grizzly bears reveals

Features

A hand holding glowing prion proteins, from which fossils and microbes emerge.

Life

A sinister, deadly brain protein could reveal the origins of all life

Features

The bones arranged in the approximate anatomical position of the right foot

Humans

Ancient human foot bones shed light on how two species coexisted

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Life

Sperm's evolutionary origins go back before multicellular animals

Analysis of the DNA and proteins of a range of animals has revealed that sperm’s molecular toolkit arose in our single-celled ancestors, perhaps more than a billion years ago

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Humans

Kissing may have evolved in an ape ancestor 21 million years ago

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Video

New Denisovan discovery could rewrite our family tree

Video

Life

Sperm are selfish – and so are we

Comment

Humans

Cradle of humanity is still revealing new insights about our origins

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