March 14, 2025
Fossils found in China could add a new branch to the human family tree

Fossils found in China could add a new branch to the human family tree

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The history of man’s evolution is long and complicated – and becomes more complicated every year.

Discoveries in the past two decades have added new branches to the human family tree, including species such as the hobbit-like Homo Floresiensis and the strongly built Homo Naledi.

A small finger bone, which was recovered in the Denisova Cave in the Siberian Altai Mountains in 2010, also led to the idea of ​​an independent old human population, the so-called Denisova people, with which some people have common ancestors today.

Now researchers are trying to solve the puzzle that is a collection of human -like fossils that have been evading every explanation for decades.

We are a family

Digitally reconstructed skulls show petrified remains found in Xujiayao (left) and Xuchang. The large, low and wide shape differs from the skulls of other known hominin species. - with the kind permission of Xiujie Wu

Digitally reconstructed skulls show petrified remains found in Xujiayao (left) and Xuchang. The large, low and wide shape differs from the skulls of other known hominin species. – with the kind permission of Xiujie Wu

Skull fragments, teeth and pine found in various places in China have caused some researchers to assume that they have found the remains of a previously unknown old human relative.

The scientists suggest that the human ancestors who had an extremely large brain that was greater than that of modern man, Homo Juluensis.

The designation of a newly identified manner appears controversial to some experts.

However, researchers Christopher Bae, professor at the University of Hawaii in Manoa, and his colleague Wu Xiujie, senior professor at the Beijing Institute for vertebrate paleontology and paleoanthropology, believe that the difficult to understand Denisova people could also belong to this The people living in the cave could still be returned.

Across the universe

Since its discovery in 2007, astronomers have been trying to find out what causes the mysterious fast radio eruptions from space. The flashes release more energy in milliseconds than the sun in one day.

Now the RadioLESCOP Canadian Hydrogen Intensity Mapping Experiment has helped researchers to determine the sources of two recently described outbursts.

Scientists attributed one to the turbulent, magnetically active region around a rapidly rotating star called Magnetar. According to a new study, the other pulsates on the edge of a distant old, dead galaxy that no longer produces stars.

The completely different points of origin have caused astronomers to assume that the flashes can occur in different environments. The unveiling could help clarify the causes of the phenomenon.

Wild kingdom

The bed songs with brush tails domestic in Australia are beams that resemble tiny kangaroos. - WWF-AUS/Think Mammoth

The bed songs with brush tails domestic in Australia are beams that resemble tiny kangaroos. – WWF-AUS/Think Mammoth

Due to its appearance and the bag in which his boys are located, you could confuse the bed song with the brushtail with a miniature kangaroo.

But the small bag animal has a not so warm and fluffy side: the baby, the so -called Joey, throws out in its bag and hops when it is threatened by predators. The brutal strategy is necessary for the survival of a species whose population has decreased by 90 %-and which has even disappeared from the Yorke Peninsula in South Australia.

Nature conservation efforts aim to bring the bush tail bed song back to his home country, where he plays an important ecological role. While the beams dig their main food from underground mushrooms, they ventilate the ground and promote the growth of plants that are dependent on other animals.

Look up

A ring doorbell camera held the moment when a meteorite hit the entrance area of ​​a house on the Canadian Prince Edward Island-where the local professor Joe Velaidum had been stood shortly before.

Scientists have now confirmed that the copy, which was named after the nearby capital Charlottetown, is actually a space stone that fell onto the earth in July.

While videos used to document meteorite impacts, it is the first time that you saw a meteorite impact from such a short distance and with sound.

The space rock probably spent millions of years to race to race our solar system before it ended up in its new home: the meteorite collection of the University of Alberta.

Other worlds

Thousands of hills cover the lowlands of Mars and could be the key to understanding the past of the red planet.

The high -towering features are similar to the hills and table mountains of the Monument Valley along the border between Arizona and Utah. According to a new analysis of orbital images, ancient water flows that existed 4 to 3.8 billion years ago probably eroded and shaped the formations.

The hills contain layers of minerals that can provide information about the history of water on Mars, and they could be examined by the Rover Exomars Rosalind Franklin of the European Space Organization, which is expected to start in 2028.

The formations have also given an insight into one of the greatest secrets of Mars – why the planet has a clear border between the highly towering plateaus of its southern hemisphere and the flat levels of the northern hemisphere.

Curiosities

Expand your knowledge with these fascinating reading:

– Melted metals in the earth core create a constantly moving magnetic field, which means that the magnetic north pole is not fixed. It is now closer to Siberia than five years ago – and it continues to drift towards Russia.

-Cameraons helped scientists to discover rare species, including the sun bear, and in Cambodia, a threatened threat of deer named Großweih-Muntjak was sighted for the first time, in an almost unexplored part of the Southeast Asian country.

– Archaeologists in Denmark have excavated hundreds of slices on which the sun is engraved. The researchers assume that Stone Age farmers burst the “solar stones” in response to a devastating volcanic eruption almost 5,000 years ago.

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