7 December 2022
The conventional view of the age of the dinosaurs is that mammals lived in the shadows until the day the asteroid hit, but a new analysis shows they were already evolutionarily primed to take over the world
5 December 2022
It took a lot of meat to feed even one species of large carnivorous dinosaur, so how did several survive side-by-side in the Jurassic and Cretaceous periods without starving? We might finally have the answer
11 October 2022
A fossil previously categorised as a hyena-like mammal is actually an early member of a group of sabre-toothed carnivores called nimravids. Its advanced features suggest these animals evolved rapidly
31 August 2022
The extinction of the dinosaurs left an ecological hole that was quickly filled by mammals, which rapidly developed larger bodies. Now it seems this evolutionary growth spurt was a result of living life in fast forward
28 April 2022
An ultra-long neck would seem to put aquatic plesiosaurs at a disadvantage, but it turns out their big bodies helped avoid drag while swimming
31 March 2022
After the extinction of the dinosaurs, mammals took over and had room to evolve larger bodies, but their brains remained small to begin with
9 June 2021
By 340 million years ago, our ancient fish-like ancestors had evolved to walk on land – but within about 10 million years, some of them had adapted to an aquatic life again
29 April 2020
For years, the oldest turtle fossils we could find had fully formed shells. Now, more primitive fossils are revealing the strange tale of how turtle shells evolved
