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Fossils

In the new study, researchers analyzed fossilized teeth, including two from Thomas the T. rex.

Tyrannosaurus Rex Was a Warm-Blooded Dinosaur, With a Body Temperature Similar to That of Humans, Study Suggests

A tooth analysis hints that the fearsome predator ran at a toasty 97 degrees Fahrenheit. Maintaining that internal temperature may have allowed it to inhabit a range stretching from modern-day Alaska to Mexico during the Cretaceous period

The Earth in the Mesozoic Era, when dinosaurs roamed the planet, looked much unlike how it does today—even beyond presence of creatures like Giganotosaurus.

Five Ways the World of the Dinosaurs Looked Different From Ours, Beyond the Presence of the ‘Terrible Lizards’

Earth has changed dramatically since the Age of Dinosaurs, from its climate to geography and animal life

Scientists think a Nanotyrannus or a young Tyrannosaurus rex might have eaten the bird.

A 66-Million-Year-Old Feather Trapped in Dinosaur Poop Might Help Explain Why Some Birds Survived Mass Extinction

Discovered in Montana in 2016, the cherry-size coprolite contains feathers, bones and evidence of the bird’s last meal before the creature was eaten by a theropod

A geologist first spotted the tooth while conducting a survey for conservation purposes. 

Cool Finds

A Geologist in California Found Something Strange Sticking Out of a Creek. A Reverse Image Search Told Her It Was an Ancient Mastodon Tooth

Pacific mastodons roamed parts of North America before disappearing along with other Ice Age megafauna around 11,700 years ago

Researchers estimate the T. rex was walking at a speed of roughly 3.4 to 4.5 miles per hour.

These Four Giant Dinosaur Footprints Discovered in North Dakota Might Represent the First Trackway Made by an Adult T. Rex Ever Found

A high school teacher first spotted the remarkable trail while volunteering on a paleontological dig. Researchers suspect a hulking, full-grown dinosaur marched through the then-swampy landscape roughly 66.5 million years ago

Miracinonyx trumani that lived in modern-day Wyoming hunted mainly herbivores, such as the Saiga antelope illustrated here, according to the study.

For Decades, Scientists Thought an ‘American Cheetah’ Once Roamed North America. Turns Out the Extinct Cat Wasn’t a Cheetah

Ancient DNA from fossils found in Wyoming and Canada’s Yukon Territory suggests the wild cat more closely resembled modern pumas than modern cheetahs

An artist's rendition of a titanosaur nest. 

To Researchers’ Surprise, This Giant Dinosaur Laid Eggs in a Cold Climate

A new study suggests that titanosaurs used rotting vegetation to keep their eggs warm much like crocodiles do today

Scientists studied the fossils of prehistoric relatives of katydids.

Scientists Recreated the Long-Lost Chirps of Jurassic Insects. Listen to the Simulated Soundscape of 165 Million Years Ago

With artificial intelligence and careful modeling of fossilized wings, researchers reproduced how some extinct, katydid-like insects might have made noise

The researchers have collected thousands of coral samples since 2006.

Corals Reveal El Niño Events Have Become Stronger in Recent Decades, Probably Because Humans Have Been Heating Up the Planet

Researchers used elements trapped within Galápagos corals to understand natural swings in the climate over the past millennium. They hint that variability has gone up over the past 40 years compared to preindustrial times

An artist's interpretation of what Chosha praecursor might have looked like while splitting its time between water and land 324 million years ago in what is now Texas.

This Ancient Insect Had 24 Legs—and Could Help Explain How the Ancestors of Modern-Day Bugs Took Over the Land

A previously undescribed critter that lived 324 million years ago appears to have been a transitional species that lived between land and sea. It could help researchers fill an 80-million-year gap in the fossil record of how crustaceans evolved into insects

Scientists reconstructed the ancient forest canopy using fragments of fossilized leaves.

Forests Didn’t Fare Well During an Ancient Global Warming Event, Offering a ‘Cautionary’ Tale About Today’s Climate Change

An intense global warming event 56 million years ago caused a forest in modern-day Wyoming to lose around 60 percent of its canopy cover, and it took more than 100,000 years to bounce back, a study suggests

Illustration of the La Brea Tar Pit's ancient habitat, with the newly discovered toad species (center and right) and the Mexican burrowing toad (bottom)

Paleontologists Discover a New Species of Ice Age Toad at the La Brea Tar Pits, Offering Clues About the Area’s Ancient Climate

The fossilized remains, recovered in 1929, were part of La Brea’s relatively understudied amphibian collection. Since toads are cold-blooded and sensitive to environmental changes, the discovery can help researchers piece together past climate conditions

After being closed to the public for more than 80 years, the Nature and Us gallery, photographed here in 1911, will reopen in September.

Closed to the Public Since WWII, a ‘Hidden’ Gallery at London’s Natural History Museum Opens Its Doors Once Again

Animal skeletons, Neolithic tools and pop culture memorabilia are among the dozens of objects to be displayed in the reopened “Nature and Us” exhibition

An illustration of Chiniquodon theotonicus, including a pregnant female and a nursing female

When Did Animals Start Giving Birth to Live Young? This 236-Million-Year-Old Fossil Might Rewrite Mammals’ Evolutionary History

A bone feature found in a mammal ancestor hints that the creature was relatively large as a newborn, more in line with the size of a creature birthed live than hatched from an egg. Still, it provides only indirect evidence

Anderson Taylor stands behind display cases in the Cambridge Natural History Museum in Cambridge, Illinois.

An 11-Year-Old Boy in a Small Midwestern Town Just Became the Guinness World Record Holder for Being the Youngest Museum Curator

Four years after Anderson Taylor began collecting specimens, he opened the Cambridge Natural History Museum in Cambridge, Illinois, offering school tours and attracting visitors from across the region

A saber-toothed cat skull found at the La Brea Tar Pits

Spinal Deformities in Saber-Toothed Cat Fossils Reveal How the Now-Extinct Felines May Have Spent Their Final Days

Researchers studied saber-toothed cat vertebrae found in the La Brea Tar Pits in Los Angeles. They identified a surprisingly high number of deformations, including signs of spinal nerve tumors, hinting at a dwindling population suffering the consequences of inbreeding

German warships dating to World War II are visible again in the Danube River, as they were in 2024 as pictured here.   

The Danube River Has Fallen to Record-Low Water Levels, Revealing Nazi Warships, Bombs and Woolly Mammoth Bones In Its Channel

Residents and researchers are finding historic and prehistoric relics as Europe’s second-longest river dries

This illustration shows an ichthyosaur biting a pterosaur, with a pliosaur preparing to attack from below.

Rare Fossil Reveals a Three-Tier Food Chain Frozen in Time: a Pterosaur Eaten by an Ichthyosaur Eaten by a Pliosaur

Uncovered in part by amateur fossil hunters in Australia, the fossil preserves a unique look at prehistoric predatory dynamics

A collection of mammoth bones in a pit in Austria

Ice Age Humans Mostly Killed Female Woolly Mammoths, Suggests Ancient DNA

After analyzing more than 500 mammoth bones, researchers found that ancient humans disproportionately hunted female mammoths for reasons still unknown

The recently discovered ancient snake species probably burrowed underground, while another of a similar age likely lived on the surface.

How Did Some Reptiles Lose Their Limbs to Become Snakes? An 80-Million-Year-Old Fossil Helps Uncover the Winding Evolutionary History

Researchers have long suspected that the first of these slithering creatures lived in water, on land or underground. New research hints that more than one environment might be correct

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