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Categories: Anthropology: Cultures, Mathematics: Statistics

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Seeking to better understand more about the origins and movement of bubonic plague, in ancient and contemporary times, researchers have completed a painstaking granular examination of hundreds of modern and ancient genome sequences, creating the largest analysis of its kind.

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Synthetic populations are computer-generated models that mimic real-world populations in terms of characteristics such as age, gender, and occupation; they are useful when conducting social simulations. In a recent study, researchers developed a new approach to assign workplaces to individuals in a synthetic Japanese population with household information, based on ODI (Origin-Destination-Industry) data. Their efforts will enable more accurate, realistic simulations of the day-time distribution of workers in Japan, helping to improve decision-making and planning.

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Neanderthals in Combe-Grenal (France) preferred to hunt in open environments, and their hunting strategies did not alter during periods of climatic change, according to a new study.

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The movement of people across the Bering Sea from North Asia to North America is a well-known phenomenon in early human history. Nevertheless, the genetic makeup of the  people who lived in North Asia during this time has remained mysterious due to a limited number of ancient genomes analyzed from this region. Now, researchers describe genomes from ten individuals up to 7,500 years old that help to fill the gap and show geneflow from people moving in the opposite direction from North America to North Asia.

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The analysis of ancient DNA allows scientists to trace human evolution and make important discoveries about modern populations. The data revealed by ancient DNA sampling can be valuable, but the human remains that carry this ancient DNA are often those of the ancestors of modern Indigenous groups, and some communities have expressed concerns about the ethics of sampling by outside parties. A group of scientists make the case for involvement of descendant communities in all aspects of the research process.

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Using a new method based upon comparing DNA mutation rates between parents and offspring, evolutionary biologists have revealed the average age of mothers versus fathers over the past 250,000 years, including the discovery that the age gap is shrinking, with women's average age at conception increasing from 23.2 years to 26.4 years, on average, in the past 5,000 years.

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A new paper presents a mathematical model for the motion of bacteria that includes cell division and death, the basic ingredients of the cell cycle.

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Archaeologists have uncovered projectile points in Idaho that are thousands of years older than any previously found in the Americas, helping to fill in the history of how early humans crafted and used stone weapons.

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Sediment cores obtained from Eifel maar sites provide insight into the presence of large Ice Age mammals in Central Europe over the past 60,000 years: Overkill hypothesis not confirmed. Herds of megafauna, such as mammoth and bison, have roamed the prehistoric plains in what is today's Central Europe for several tens of thousands of years. As woodland expanded at the end of the last Ice Age, the numbers of these animals declined and by roughly 11,000 years ago, they had completely vanished from this region. Thus, the growth of forests was the main factor that determined the extinction of such megafauna in Central Europe.

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A new study shows machine-learning models trained using simple symptoms, demographic features are effective in predicting COVID-19 infections.

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Modern Papuans' immune system likely evolved with a little help from the Denisovans, a mysterious human ancestor who interbred with ancient humans, according to a new study.

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A new study analyzing stone tools from southern China provides the earliest evidence of rice harvesting, dating to as early as 10,000 years ago. The researchers identified two methods of harvesting rice, which helped initiate rice domestication.

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Devastating megafires are becoming more common, in part, because the planet is warming. But a new study suggests bringing 'good fire' back to the U.S. and other wildfire fire-prone areas, as Native Americans once did, could potentially blunt the role of climate in triggering today's wildfires.

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For over a century, one of the earliest human fossils ever discovered in Spain has been long considered a Neanderthal. However, new analysis from an international research team dismantles this century-long interpretation, demonstrating that this fossil is not a Neanderthal; rather, it may actually represent the earliest presence of Homo sapiens ever documented in Europe.

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A team of researchers has identified a group of human DNA sequences driving changes in brain development, digestion and immunity that seem to have evolved rapidly after our family line split from that of the chimpanzees, but before we split with the Neanderthals.

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A new statistical method provides a more efficient way to uncover biologically meaningful changes in genomic data that span multiple conditions -- such as cell types or tissues.

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Archeologists have identified one of the largest known sacred buildings of the Etruscans. The temple's strata offer insights into more than 1000 years of development of one of the most important Etruscan cities. The newly discovered temple is roughly the same size and on a similar alignment as the neighboring Tempio Grande, and was built at roughly the same Archaic time. This duplication of monumental buildings in an Etruscan city is rare, and indicates an exceptional finding.

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Researchers have unearthed an ivory comb from 1700 BCE inscribed with a plea to eradicate lice. The finding provides direct evidence for the use of the Canaanite alphabet in daily activities some 3700 years ago.

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Archaeological researchers have identified human remains as a child, who may have been laid on a bed of down in a Stone Age burial site discovered in Eastern Finland. There may also have been a canid at the child's feet. It reveals interesting details of how Stone Age humans buried their dead about 8000 years ago.

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Using DNA from two ancient humans unearthed in two different archaeological sites in northeast Brazil, researchers have unraveled the deep demographic history of South America at the regional level with some surprising results. Not only do they provide new genetic evidence supporting existing archaeological data of the north-to-south migration toward South America, they also have discovered migrations in the opposite direction along the Atlantic coast -- for the first time. Among the key findings, they also have discovered evidence of Neanderthal ancestry within the genomes of ancient individuals from South America.