The question of the mode of origin of modern humans (Homo sapiens) has dominated
palaeoanthropological debate over the last decade. This review discusses the main models …

The fate of the Neanderthal populations of Europe and western Asia has gripped the
popular and scientific imaginations for the past century. Following at least 200,000 years of …

Positive reinforcement helps to control the acquisition of learned behaviours. Here we report
a cellular mechanism in the brain that may underlie the behavioural effects of positive …

New radiocarbon dates from the sites of Bockstein-Törle, Geißenklösterle, Hohle Fels,
Hohlenstein-Stadel, Sirgenstein, and Vogelherd in the Swabian Jura of southwestern …

Our knowledge of Neanderthals is based on a limited number of remains and artifacts from
which we must make inferences about their biology, behavior, and relationship to ourselves …

The earliest known personal ornaments come from the Middle Stone Age of southern Africa,
c. 75,000 years ago, and are associated with anatomically modern humans. In Europe, such …

The 2002 discovery of a robust modern human mandible in the Peştera cu Oase,
southwestern Romania, provides evidence of early modern humans in the lower Danubian …

The expansion of premodern humans into western and eastern Europe∼ 40,000 years
before the present led to the eventual replacement of the Neanderthals by modern …

Archeological analysis of faunal remains and of lithic and bone tools has suggested that
hunting of medium to large mammals was a major element of Neanderthal subsistence …

Radiocarbon dating has been fundamental to the study of human cultural and biological
development over the past 50,000 yr. Two recent developments in the methodology of …