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Paleontology

Tyrannosaurus rex probably wasn't full-grown until around age 40, new research suggests.

Tyrannosaurus Rex Was Probably a Late Bloomer—and May Have Taken Around 40 Years to Grow Up

The behemoth dinosaurs grew more slowly and had longer life spans than previously thought, a new study suggests

An illustration of Procoptodon goliah, a giant kangaroo that weighed up to about 550 pounds and went extinct around 40,000 years ago

Giant Kangaroos That Lived During the Ice Age May Have Hopped—Despite Weighing Up to 550 Pounds

The extinct animals may have bounced from scary situations, such as coming face to face with hungry predators

Shovel-tusked elephants like Amebelodon were discovered nearly a century ago, and paleontologists have learned more about their anatomy and behavior with time. This 1932 illustration was later found to be inaccurate, as Amebelodon actually had a longer and narrower trunk.

Strange, Shovel-Tusked Elephants Puzzled Paleontologists, Until Experts Took a Closer Look at Their Teeth

The animals’ extended lower jaws were seemingly made for scooping, but research over the past few decades has found they could do a lot more than initially expected

An illustration of a member of the Prototaxites genus, which lived between 420 million and 375 million years ago

This Mysterious 407-Million-Year-Old Fossil May Represent a Previously Unknown Branch of Life

Earth’s first large land organisms—tree trunk-like beings that stood up to 26 feet tall—weren’t early fungi but, rather, something else entirely, a study suggests

A reconstruction of what Manipulonyx reshetovi may have looked like

This Dinosaur May Have Used Its Strange Clawed Hands to Pilfer and Pierce Eggs

A fresh analysis of a fossil found almost 50 years ago reveals a newly described genus named for its “manipulating claw”

Strange fossils reveal that predatory fish with a wide array of dental setups once stalked prehistoric waters.

Sharklike Fish With Weird, Buzz-Saw Jaws Sliced Through the Seas, Then Vanished. Now, Paleontologists Are Unraveling Their Secrets

These “total monsters of fishes” are extinct today, though new clues about their lives come from CT scans and their closest living relatives: the big-eyed ratfish of the deep sea

Bones from a chimpanzee on the left, Sahelanthropus tchadensis in the center, and an Australopithecus species on the right

New Fossil Analysis Suggests This Seven-Million-Year-Old Primate Walked on Two Legs, Potentially Making It the Oldest Known Human Ancestor

Fresh findings about arm and leg bones advance the debate over whether Sahelanthropus tchadensis was bipedal, but not everyone is convinced

Newly discovered species filled gaps in dinosaur evolution and shed light on historic migrations, while other studies offered new ways to date remains and made key insights about diets.

The Top Ten Dinosaur Discoveries of 2025, From Preserved Blood Vessels to the Return of a Short King

With studies of fossilized bones, gut contents, eggshells and more, paleontologists revealed new and captivating details about the enormous reptiles that once roamed the Earth

In 2025, researchers watched an interstellar comet, learned about human origins and traced the spread of measles.

The Ten Most Significant Science Stories of 2025, From Medical Breakthroughs to an Interstellar Visitor

All year long, these moments captivated the public, demonstrated dangerous trends, and pushed research and innovation forward

Ancient bees built nests in the hollows of rodent skulls, a new study suggests

Fossils Suggest That Some Ancient Burrowing Bees Made Their Homes in Rodent Skulls

While cleaning fossils retrieved from a cave on a Caribbean island, a researcher noticed something strange in the hollow tooth socket of a small skull

Side view of NMNH's newly acquired Pachycephalosaurus skull, which is a rare, nearly complete specimen

Nearly Complete Skull of a Dome-Headed Dinosaur Makes Its Way to the Smithsonian’s National Museum of Natural History

The remarkable skull will be on display from December 22 through December 28. After spending the next few years behind the scenes for research, it will join NMNH’s permanently showcased fossil collection

Each strand of yarn traces the tracks that make up an ancient trackway.

This Site in Bolivia Boasts 16,600 Exposed Dinosaur Footprints—The Most Ever Found in One Location

Paleontologists counted the record-setting tracks and uncovered evidence of dinosaurs swimming and dragging their tails along what was a muddy superhighway for the animals millions of years ago

An illustration of ancient sea cows

A Trove of Sea Cow Fossils in Qatar Reveals a New Species That Munched on Seagrass 21 Million Years Ago

The findings suggest that sea cows have been engineering ecosystems in the Persian Gulf for tens of millions of years

The Burtele foot, discovered in 2009

The Human Relative Who Owned This 3.4-Million-Year-Old Foot May Have Belonged to a Species That Lived Alongside Lucy

Newfound fossils in modern-day Ethiopia suggest that the mysterious foot belonged to a recently named species, Australopithecus deyiremeda. The finding could alter the story of human evolution

Researchers used more than 400 samples of materials, such as this carbon-rich substance, to train and test the new A.I. system. 

Cool Finds

A.I. Reveals Signs of Early Life in 3.3-Billion-Year-Old Rocks. Next, It Could Continue the Search in Space

The new approach looks at the distribution of molecular fragments in material, allowing for broad surveys in degraded specimens

One of the woolly mammoth's legs

Scientists Extract the Oldest RNA Ever Found, Revealing How a Woolly Mammoth’s Genes May Have Functioned 40,000 Years Ago

The frozen remains of a juvenile woolly mammoth named Yuka preserved details about the animal’s last moments alive

Modern-day crocodiles like this one arrived in Australia about 3.8 million years ago. But a distant branch of them that lived there tens of millions of years ago included some members that dropped from trees onto prey. 

Paleontologists Unearthed Australia’s Oldest Known Crocodile Eggshells. The Reptiles’ Relatives May Have Hunted From the Trees

The eggshells belonged to an extinct group of crocs, some members of which were “drop crocs” that plunged onto prey

Scientists have identified a new species of non-biting midge—a type of small fly—from 151-million-year-old specimens discovered by an amateur fossil hunter.

This Amateur Fossil Hunter Discovered a 151-Million-Year-Old Insect—and It’s a New Species

Retired teacher Robert Beattie, now 82, has been digging up remnants of the past ever since he was a child

An artist's rendition of a group of Nanotyrannus dinosaurs attacking a juvenile T. rex

This Tiny Tyrannosaur Could Settle a Huge Scientific Debate

A new analysis of a fossil unearthed in 2006 provides a fresh line of evidence that a separate tyrannosaur lineage called Nanotyrannus lived alongside the famous T. rex

New research suggests a genetic dynamic that may have contributed to Neanderthals' extinction.

A Single Gene Could Have Contributed to Neanderthals’ Extinction, Study Suggests

New research posits that a genetic incompatibility between female offspring of humans and Neanderthals and their children could have led to pregnancy complications and the eventual end of the species

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