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Homo sapiens already reached northwest Europe more than 45,000 years ago

Former Departments
Human Evolution

The arrival of Homo sapiens in cold northern latitudes took place several thousand years before Neanderthals disappeared in southwest Europe

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Balzan Prizes 2023 for Max Planck researchers

Former Departments
Human Evolution

Jean-Jacques Hublin and Heino Falcke are among the four winners of the prestigious prize

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Great white sharks may have contributed to megalodon extinction

Former Departments
Human Evolution

Using zinc isotopes, researchers investigated the diet of megalodon, the largest shark to have ever lived

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Neanderthals of the North

Former Departments
Human Evolution

Flexible adaptation to changing environmental conditions

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Early modern human from Southeast Asia adapted to a rainforest environment

Human Evolution

New insights into the diet of our species' earliest member in the tropical rainforest of Southeast Asia

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Early Homo sapiens groups in Europe faced subarctic climates

Human Evolution

New insights into the climatic backdrop for an early wave of dispersal of our species into Europe during the last glacial period

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Climatically driven landscape evolution during warm periods

Human Evolution

New puzzle piece for understanding future natural systems

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The last battle of Anne of Brittany

Human Evolution

Isotopic study of the soldiers of 1491

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Neandertals’ main food source was definitely meat

Human Evolution

Isotope analyses performed on single amino acids in Neandertals’ collagen samples shed new light on their debated diet

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Neandertal genes influence brain development of modern humans

Human Evolution

DNA fragments from Neandertals in the human genome shed light on brain evolution

A characteristic feature of modern humans is the unusually round…

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Bone knife from Morocco: oldest specialized bone tool associated with Aterian culture

Human Evolution

New find indicates the appearance of a unique technological complex in North Africa around 90,000 years ago

A single bone artefact found in a…

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Germany was covered by glaciers 450,000 years ago

Human Evolution

New chronological data for the Middle Pleistocene glacial cycles push back the first glaciation and early human appearance in central Germany by about…

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Neanderthals thought like we do

Human Evolution

As early as 64,000 years ago Iberian Neanderthals created cave paintings

At least 70,000 years ago Homo sapiens used perforated marine shells and…

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January 24, 2018: Modern human brain organization emerged only recently

Human Evolution

Homo sapiens fossils demonstrate a gradual evolution of the human brain towards its modern globular shape

In a paper researchers from the Max Planck…

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Fossil ape skull confirms African origin of apes and humans

Human Evolution

13-million-year-old “Alesi“, a fossil discovered in Kenya, sheds light on ape ancestry

The discovery in Kenya of a remarkably complete fossil ape…

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Award ceremony in Morocco

Human Evolution

Royal award for Max Planck Director

Jean-Jacques Hublin, Director of the Human Evolution Department at the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary…

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The first of our kind

Human Evolution

Scientists discover the oldest Homo sapiens fossils at Jebel Irhoud, Morocco

New finds of fossils and stone tools from the archaeological site of…

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9,500-year-old funerary rituals involving the reduction of fresh corpses discovered in east central Brazil

Human Evolution

Findings from Lapa do Santo show oldest evidence in the continent of humans performing elaborated funerary rituals based on the manipulation and…

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Palaeoproteomics helps differentiate between modern humans and Neandertals

Human Evolution

Researchers decode ancient proteins of Châtelperronian Neandertals

The Châtelperronian of central France and northern Spain is critical to the debate…

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Homo erectus walked as we do

Human Evolution

1.5-million-year-old footprints provide window to the life of Homo erectus

Fossil bones and stone tools can tell us a lot about human evolution, but…

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