Lead exposure may have spelled evolutionary success for humans—and extinction for our ancient cousins—but other scientists ...

Scientists found that ancient lead exposure shaped early human evolution. The toxin may have played a surprising role in the development of modern cognition and language. An international team of ...

When we think of lead poisoning, most of us imagine modern human-made pollution, paint, old pipes, or exhaust fumes.

For decades, Paranthropus boisei, an early hominin that roamed eastern Africa a million years ago, was known for its gigantic ...

An international study changes the view that exposure to the toxic metal lead is largely a post-industrial phenomenon. The ...

Lead poisoning isn’t just an industrial-age problem. A new study reveals our ancestors, including Neanderthals, were exposed ...

When scientists found the skull, named Yunxian 2, they assumed it belonged to an earlier ancestor of ours, Homo erectus, the ...

Long before factories, mines, and cars filled the air with pollution, our distant ancestors were already living with a silent ...

The findings have the potential to resolve the longstanding "Muddle in the Middle" of human evolution, researchers said.

Learn more about Ardipithecus ramidus and how their ankle bone paints a better picture of how our ancestors transitioned from ...

Decades after a skull was unearthed in China’s Hubei Province, researchers said they suspect a much earlier and more complex ...