Neandertals -- the closest ancestor to modern humans -- possessed the ability to perceive and produce human speech, according to a new study published by an international multidisciplinary team of researchers including Binghamton University anthropology professor Rolf Quam and graduate student Alex Velez.

A small team of researchers from France, Italy and the U.S., has found evidence that suggests Sahelanthropus tchadensis was not a hominin, and thus was not the earliest known human ancestor. In their paper published in Journal of Human Evolution, the group describes their study of the fossilized leg bone and what it showed them.

An important cell in mice and humans' immune systems has been shown to have gut-healing properties in mice with a form of inflammatory bowel disease (IBD).

Lots of us are feeling pretty anxious about the destruction of the natural world. It turns out, humans aren't the only ones stressing out—by analyzing hormones that accumulate in fur, researchers found that rodents and marsupials living in smaller patches of South America's Atlantic Forest are under more stress than ones living in more intact forests.

Beautiful diagrams exploring the nervous system from two pioneers in the field.

The first complete map of a platypus genome has just been released, and it's every bit as strange as you'd expect from a creature with 10 sex chromosomes, a pair of venomous spurs, a coat of fluorescent fur, and skin that 'sweats' milk.

Many botanists dispute idea of plant sentience, but study of climbing beans sows seed of doubt

Octopuses are vulnerable, like a snail without a shell, so they have to really use their wits to stay alive in the dangerous ocean.

The werewolf mouse

In bacterial battles, there is more than just direct killing. Some bacteria even challenge their prey by destroying their bacterial houses. We could learn a lot from these microscopic combats for our own fights against bacterial superbugs.

A tiny brown invasive species of spider that's creeping its way across the UK has a dangerous reputation for dissolving flesh, one that many experts have argued isn't deserved.

A team led by UT Southwestern has derived a new "intermediate" embryonic stem cell type from multiple species that can contribute to chimeras and create precursors to sperm and eggs in a culture dish. The findings, published online this week in Cell Stem Cell, could lead to a host of advances in basic biology, regenerative medicine, and reproductive technology.

Cellular reprogramming can reverse the aging that leads to a decline in the activities and functions of mesenchymal stem/stromal cells (MSCs). This is something that scientists have known for a while. But what they had not figured out is which molecular mechanisms are responsible for this reversal.

First we discovered platypus would look great at a rave, now wombats, bilbies and other marsupials can join the blacklight party - with scientists unexpectedly finding they all glow wonderfully fluorescent greens, blues and pinks beneath UV light.

New research links serotonin and dopamine not just to addiction and depression, but to the ability to control genes.

Research offers insights into marsupial’s rearguard defences and ‘brutal’ mating rituals

Monkeys, much like humans, could be engaged in the process of self-domesticating themselves, altering the course of their own evolution and physiology through the way they behave with one another, new research suggests.

German scientists from the Fraunhofer Institute for Production Systems and Design Technology have invented a new type of bioplastic that is produced from waste and decomposes in 12 months. The new production technology is reported by New Atlas.

The astonishing secrets of fungal life raise profound questions

Several complete skeletons of the unusual feathered two-fingered dinosaurs were unearthed in the Gobi Desert.