Extinction

A diverse array of trilobites ruled the seas for almost 300 million years, until they vanished at the end of the Permian period.

Vinegar-Like Acid Rain May Have Fallen During Earth’s Worst Extinction

Vanilla-flavored rocks hint at a planet scoured by intense acid rain during the Great Dying 252 million years ago

Only 5 Northern White Rhinos remain. A powerful image of three of them under guard by Kate Brooks.

There Are Probably Just Five Northern White Rhinos Left

The death of a captive rhino at the San Diego Zoo brings the species closer to imminent extinction

Fred Tomaselli, Migrant Fruit Thugs, 2006.

The Threatened Birds in These Artworks Might One Day Go the Way of the Dodo

The Smithsonian American Art Museum's exhibition explores mankind's relationship to birds and the natural world

The skeleton was discovered near the American Falls dam and reservoir in Idaho.

What Appears to Be a Complete Mammoth Skeleton Was Discovered in an Idaho Ditch

A nearby reservoir has just covered the fossil in water, however, postponing the excavation

Wildlife Around the World Has Declined by About 50 Percent Since 1970

Fish, birds, mammals, amphibians and reptiles are disappearing quickly

More than two years after his death, the tortoise Lonesome George has been stuffed and put on display in New York.

Lonesome George, the Last Tortoise of His Kind, Is on Posthumous Display in NYC

Driven to extinction by overhunting, the world's last Pinta Island tortoise is now a taxidermy display at New York's American Museum of Natural History

An inlaid alabaster unguent jar in the form of an ibex, with one natural horn, was found in the tomb of the pharaoh Tutankhamun.

Egypt’s Mammal Extinctions Tracked Through 6,000 Years of Art

Tomb goods and historical texts show how a drying climate and an expanding human population took their toll on the region’s wildlife

From the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History

100 Years After Her Death, Martha, the Last Passenger Pigeon, Still Resonates

The famed bird now finds itself at the center of a flap over de-extinction

Changila, a male elephant who was later killed by poachers near Samburu National Reserve in Kenya.

Surprise! Science Shows That Elephant Poaching Is Unsustainable

For the first time, scientists have made a comprehensive tally of illegal killing rates across Africa

Why Everyone From Conservationists to Yao Ming to Andrew Cuomo Supports Banning Ivory Sales

Because of corruption and laundering, any system of legal ivory trade threatens the continued existence of elephants

Not so mysterious: This is not a realistic depiction of a T. rex dinner.

The Ten Biggest Dinosaur Mysteries We Have Yet to Solve

Which one was the first, the biggest, the fuzziest? These puzzles continue to perplex paleontologists

The ecology of the meat-eaters like Allosaurus fragilis were likely threatened by the decline of the plant-eating dinosaurs, making the "perfect storm" for a mass extinction

Why the Dinosaurs Could Have Had a Chance of Surviving the Asteroid Strike

A new study suggests it wasn't just the asteroid that killed the dinos, but that other factors weakened their ability to survive it

When the Last of the Great Auks Died, It Was by the Crush of a Fisherman's Boot

Birds once plentiful and abundant, are the subject of a new exhibition at the Natural History Museum

None

Watch the Unnerving Gait of This 410 Million-Year-Old Arachnid

Working from well-preserved fossils, paleontologists reproduced the trigonotarbids' walk

Europe Has Its Own Bison Species That Came Back From the Brink of Extinction

Bison were just reintroduced into a stretch of Romania where they haven't been found for two centuries

Dinosaurs came in all shapes and sizes, but only the small, feathered variety survived.

Ancient Birds Avoided Mass Extinction By Shrinking

The shrinkage process was well underway before an asteroid brought doom to the dinosaurs 66 million years ago

Artist Todd McGrain's sculptures of five extinct North American birds are now on display in Smithsonian gardens.

Bronze Sculptures of Five Extinct Birds Land in Smithsonian Gardens

Artist Todd McGrain memorializes species long-vanished, due to human impact on their habitats, in his "Lost Bird Project"

Colorful archaea grow in in ponds.

How a Single Act of Evolution Nearly Wiped Out All Life on Earth

A single gene transfer event may have caused the Great Dying

Humans Killed the Moa, Genetics Study Suggests

Yet another species humans have the distinct honor of eradicating

The Anguilla Bank skink, a Caribbean species discovered along with 23 others in 2012, is vulnerable to extinction.

How Many Species Can We Find Before They Disappear Forever?

Biologists are in a race to locate and identify new species as habitats become victim to an industrialized world

Page 13 of 17