Research by Indiana University paleobotanist David L. Dilcher and colleagues in Europe sheds new light on what Charles Darwin famously called “an abominable mystery”: the apparently sudden appearance and rapid spread of flowering plants in the fossil record.
Writing in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, the researchers present a scenario in which flowering plants, or angiosperms, evolved and colonized various types of aquatic environments over about 45 million years in the early to middle Cretaceous Period. (117)

Skeletal remains found by an international team, in a cave about 30 miles northwest of Johannesburg South African cave may yield new clues to human development and answer key questions of the evolution of the human lineage. The team consisting of members from U.S., African, European and Australian universities, named the new species, Australopithecus sediba, in April 2010. They found skeletal remains in a cave of many individuals of Australopithecus sediba possibly belonging to a family group. They all seemed to have died suddenly in the same event about …

Paleontologists have discovered that a group of remarkable ancient sea creatures existed for much longer and grew to much larger sizes than previously thought, thanks to extraordinarily well-preserved fossils discovered in Morocco.
The creatures, known as anomalocaridids, were already thought to be the largest animals of the Cambrian period, known for the “Cambrian Explosion” that saw the sudden appearance of all the major animal groups and the establishment of complex ecosystems about 540 to 500 million years ago. Fossils from this period suggested these marine predators grew to be about two …

This is a discovery that contributes to our understanding of how distant human relatives evolved. Announced in 2001, the fossil skull was described as Kenyanthropus platyops – Flat Face Man of Kenya.

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Quite often we come across the term “Missing links ” while reading popular articles related to fossils in various news sites. The term Missing links is used to refer transitional forms.This term is mostly used in the popular media, but is always avoided in the scientific press as it is inaccurate and confusing. Majority of biologists are of the opinion that missing link is not appropriate term to use while referring to a transitional form not yet discovered in the fossil record.
What are fossils ?
Fossils are the remains of …

In the year 2004 , a new species of human termed “homo floresiensis” was discovered from Liang Bua Cave on the island of Flores which lived on the remote Indonesian island of Flores just 18,000 years ago. Homo floresiensis were tiny individuals ,roughly just about one meter in height , with grapefruit-sized skulls. These little humans , nicknamed ‘hobbits’, made tools, hunted tiny elephants and lived at the same time as modern humans who were colonizing the area. This, in combination with the unusually small stature and brain size of …

The mystery of why giant Dinosaurs suddenly became extinct can find some answers,with the discovery of major fossil field ,unearthing more that 7600 bones from Eastern part of China. Zhucheng in Shandong province is known locally as “dinosaur city” and has been in news for last 50 years for several important findings.But scientists believe this discovery ,which dates back to late Cretaceous period which is around the time when dinosaurs became extinct might helps to understand why why the creatures died out. (452)