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This illustration shows a glyptodont, a giant, armadillo-like shelled mammal that went extinct about 10,000 years ago. With a large humped shell on its back, the animal is standing near a stream and is surrounded by dense green foliage, including trees and ferns.

Glyptodonts were giant, armadillo-like shelled mammals that went extinct about 10,000 years ago. A study reveals that cut marks on a glyptodont fossil in South America could have been made by humans a little over 20,000 years ago. Daniel Eskridge/Stocktrek Images/Science Source hide caption

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Daniel Eskridge/Stocktrek Images/Science Source

Research News

When did humans get to South America? This giant shelled mammal fossil may hold clues

A fossil of an armadillo-like mammal appears to bear cut marks from butchering by humans, suggesting people were living in South America at least 20,000 years ago, even earlier than once thought.

Ancient Armadillos

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One woolly mammoth's journey at the end of the Ice Age
Julius Csotonyi

Short Wave

One woolly mammoth's journey at the end of the Ice Age

Lately, paleoecologist Audrey Rowe has been a bit preoccupied with a girl named Elma. That's because Elma is ... a woolly mammoth. And 14,000 years ago, when Elma was alive, her habitat in interior Alaska was rapidly changing. The Ice Age was coming to a close and human hunters were starting early settlements. Which leads to an intriguing question: Who, or what, killed her? In the search for answers, Audrey traces Elma's life and journey through — get this — a single tusk. Today, she shares her insights on what the mammoth extinction from thousands of years ago can teach us about megafauna extinctions today with guest host Nate Rott.

One woolly mammoth's journey at the end of the Ice Age

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A Long, Complicated Battle Over 9,000-Year-Old Bones Is Finally Over

A reconstruction of Kennewick Man sculpted to resemble the Ainu people of Japan, considered by some at the time to be his closest living relatives. Now, a link to Native Americans has been confirmed. Brittney Tatchell/Smithsonian Institute hide caption

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Brittney Tatchell/Smithsonian Institute

Code Switch

A Long, Complicated Battle Over 9,000-Year-Old Bones Is Finally Over

The 1996 discovery of Kennewick Man, one of the oldest North American human skeletons ever found, erupted in an unprecedented fight between scientists and Native American beliefs.

Can You Dig It? More Evidence Suggests Humans From The Ice Age

Students Patrick Rohrer, Sarah Warthen, Alix Piven and Lauren Urane are led by Mercyhurst University Archeologist Andy Hemmings. Their project has picked up where Florida's State Geologist Elias Sellards left off in 1915. Sellards led an excavation of the site where workers digging a drainage canal found fossilized human remains. Greg Allen/NPR hide caption

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Greg Allen/NPR

Science

Can You Dig It? More Evidence Suggests Humans From The Ice Age

Initially dismissed as a hoax a century ago, scientists have found evidence in Florida of humans living 14,000 years ago. If the findings hold up, they will help rewrite the history of early man.

Can You Dig It? More Evidence Suggests Humans From The Ice Age

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Woolly Mammoths' Taste For Flowers May Have Been Their Undoing

Woolly mammoths depended on tiny flowering plants for protein. Did the decline of the flowers cause their extinction? Per Möller/Johanna Anjar hide caption

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Per Möller/Johanna Anjar

The Salt

Woolly Mammoths' Taste For Flowers May Have Been Their Undoing

New research shows a big part of the woolly mammoth's diet was made up of tiny flowers rather than grass. When the flowers disappeared, the mammoths did, too.

Woolly Mammoths' Taste For Flowers May Have Been Their Undoing

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