News about PaperPanda, Open Access, and Research
You may already know the legend of King Tutankhamen’s space dagger – an iron weapon forged from the rock of meteorites, and entombed with the ancient Egyptian pharaoh. Now a new study has revealed more details about this most fascinating and mysterious of artifacts. A thorough chemical analysis involving high-resolution photography and X-rays has … Read more
A deposit of hundreds of embalming tools uncovered in Abusir, Egypt – probably the largest ever found – offers clues into a lavish funeral that likely took place about 2,600 years ago. The deposit of at least 370 ceramic jars – some of which carried heads to represent sacred animal deities – could provide … Read more
During low tide on Scotland’s Isle of Skye, a graduate student hunting for dinosaur bones looked down at the coastal rocks and made the discovery of a lifetime: the remains of the largest pterosaur on record from the Jurassic period. Since collecting the specimen in 2017 – an eventful excavation that involved cutting out … Read more
Earth’s last major ice age locked up gargantuan amounts of water in vast glaciers. Once they melted, it was a spectacle to behold as tremendous floods gouged channels into the face of the planet. The remnants of one of the largest of these ancient deluges are still visible in eastern Washington, in an area … Read more
By Michael Marshall Melting permafrost in Russia’s Yamal peninsula (pictured) has exposed nomadic reindeer herders (below) to anthrax Elena Shchipkova/Alamy IN NOVEMBER 2019, the US National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine held a workshop to discuss an emerging disease threat. Not covid-19: they were a couple of months too early for that. Instead, they … Read more
About 95 million years ago in what is now Australia, a massive crocodile relative clamped down with its powerful jaws on the small body of a dinosaur and gulped nearly all of it down in one mighty swallow. The crocodilian died soon after, and as it fossilized, so did the partly-digested and near-complete dinosaur … Read more
An elongated, cone-shaped skull with a possible metal implant could represent some of the earliest evidence from Peru of an ancient surgical implant. Or it could be a modern-day fake. The fact that the skull, which was donated to the Museum of Osteology in Oklahoma City, has a cone shape is nothing too unusual, … Read more
Soaring 250 miles (400 kilometers) over Earth, astronauts aboard the International Space Station (ISS) looked down on our planet last May and saw a heart-shaped oasis blooming in the Egyptian desert. Today (Feb. 14), our friends in space are sharing the striking image as a special Valentine for the whole planet, courtesy of NASA’s Earth … Read more
Homo sapiens ventured into Neanderthal territory in Europe much earlier than previously thought, according to an archaeological study published in Science magazine on Wednesday. Up to now, archaeological discoveries had indicated that Neanderthals disappeared from the European continent about 40,000 years ago, shortly after the arrival of their “cousin” H. sapiens, barely 5,000 years … Read more
Archaeologists have uncovered the largest collection of ancient Egyptian ‘notepads’ found since the beginning of the 20th century. In the long-lost city of Athribis, in central Egypt, researchers have cataloged more than 18,000 inscribed pieces of pottery, some of which seem to have been written by students. The shards of inked pottery are known … Read more