A powerful X1.1-class solar flare was released by the sun on March 28, resulting in radio blackouts across North and South America When you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission. Here's how it works. Scientists caught a massive and extremely powerful X-class solar flare being spat out from the sun on Friday (March 28), just before the stellar eruption triggered a radio blackout across two continents. A video captured by the GOES-16 satellite, which is jointly operated by NASA and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), shows the X-class solar flare bursting forth from a sunspot on the sun's surface at around 11:20 a.m. EST on March 28. This X1.1-class solar flare, which was released from a sunspot named AR4046, marks the first X-class flare the sun has released since early February. "A strong solar flare (R3) occurred and peaked at X1.1 near 11:20am EDT (1520 UTC) on 28 March, 2025. The flare occurred from the vicinity of newly rotated into view Region 4046 near the east limb," NOAA's Space Weather Prediction Center said in a statement after the flare. Related: Our sun may be overdue for a 'superflare' stronger than billions of atomic bombs, new research warns NOAA's Space Weather Prediction Center shared the spectacular video on X, formerly known as Twitter, showing the solar flare erupting from the sun alongside a cloud of solar material known as a coronal mass ejection (CME). CMEs are massive bursts of plasma and magnetic field from the sun that are ejected into space, usually during solar flares. These fast-moving blobs of plasma can cause serious disturbances to satellites and power grids if Earth happens to be in their path. Solar flares are intense bursts of electromagnetic radiation that erupt from the sun's surface, usually from magnetically active regions like sunspots. When the sun's magnetic fields tangle, break, and reconnect, massive amounts of energy are released in the form of light, heat, and charged particles. Solar flares are classified on a scale of A, B, C, M, and X. Each class is 10 times more powerful than the last, with X-class flares being the most powerful and least frequent. Get the world's most fascinating discoveries delivered straight to your inbox. Related: X-class solar flares hit a new record in 2024 and could spike further this year — but the sun isn't entirely to blame, experts say When the radiation from a solar flare is aimed toward Earth, it can cause radio blackouts across the side of the planet facing the sun. This occurs because the solar flare's intense X-rays and extreme ultraviolet radiation ionize Earth's upper atmosphere, specifically the ionosphere, which is situated between 30 miles (48 km) and 600 miles (965 km) above Earth's surface. The ionosphere consists of several layers that reflect and refract radio waves, allowing high-frequency radio signals to travel long distances around the world. When solar flares ionize the D-layer, which is the lowest part of the ionosphere, this causes radio waves to be absorbed instead of being reflected, and leads to signal degradation or complete loss of high-frequency radio communications in the affected area. A view of today's X1 (R3) flare in GOES-16 imagery at the 304A wavelength (courtesy of jhelioviewer) shows the blast of solar material associated with the flare. The CME is likely directed not Earth-directed; however analyses continues to be sure of no flanking influences. pic.twitter.com/xggvYz3Pb0March 28, 2025 This March 28 solar flare caused a radio blackout across North and South America and the Atlantic on Friday morning. "Immediate, wider area of strong degradation or signal loss in high frequency (HF) communication bands over much of the sunlit side of Earth; users of HF radio signals may experience loss of contact or major disruptions for a number of minutes to a couple of hours in the affected areas," NOAA's Space Weather Prediction Center said in the statement. When this solar flare was released, a CME followed shortly after. CMEs usually arrive at the Earth several days after a solar flare, and can trigger geomagnetic storms if they collide with the Earth's magnetic field, resulting in the appearance of the aurora. CMEs can also knock satellites out of the sky, tamper with GPS-based equipment on Earth, and trigger widespread power outages in really severe cases. Luckily, the newly-launched CME is not expected to hit our planet, so no geomagnetic storms are expected in the coming days. "The CME is likely … not Earth-directed; however analyses continues to be sure of no flanking influences," NOAA's Space Weather Prediction Center said in the caption of the X post. —Space photo of the week: Hubble zooms in on the glittering galaxy next door —Perseverance rover spots peculiar 'spider egg' rock on Mars — and scientists have no idea how it got there —Huge steam plume rises from Alaska's Mount Spurr as volcano edges closer to eruption The sunspot that caused the flare and the CME (AR4046) is moving around the sun to face our planet, meaning that if it releases any more flares or CMEs, they will likely hit the Earth head-on. "The flare source region will rotate to face Earth in the coming week. Further strong solar activity is likely!" solar astrophysicist Ryan French wrote in a post on X. Additionally, a new sunspot named AR4048 is also turning toward Earth, and is expected to churn out some powerful flares and CMEs in the coming days. According to a Space Weather Prediction Center Forecast Discussion, there is an overall 15% chance of another X-class flare occurring between March 31 and April 2, "primarily due to AR 4048". Jess Thomson is a freelance journalist. She previously worked as a science reporter for Newsweek, and has also written for publications including VICE, The Guardian, The Cut, and Inverse. Jess holds a Biological Sciences degree from the University of Oxford, where she specialised in animal behavior and ecology. Please logout and then login again, you will then be prompted to enter your display name. Eclipse map: What will tomorrow's solar eclipse look like from your state? How to watch tomorrow's solar eclipse from anywhere on Earth Hohle Fels water bird: The oldest depiction of a bird in the world Live Science is part of Future US Inc, an international media group and leading digital publisher. Visit our corporate site. © Future US, Inc. Full 7th Floor, 130 West 42nd Street, New York, NY 10036.

Every print subscription comes with full digital access The technique could convert cement manufacture from carbon superemitter to carbon sequesterer Cement production (shown) accounts for a fourth of the world's carbon emissions. But a new technique using seawater splitting might make its production carbon-negative. bfk92/E+/Getty Images Plus By Carolyn Gramling 2 hours ago A new cement-making process could shift production from being a carbon source to a carbon sink, creating a carbon-negative version of the building material, researchers report March 18 in Advanced Sustainable Systems. This process might also be adaptable to producing a variety of carbon-stashing products such as paint, plaster and concrete. Cement production is a huge contributor to global carbon dioxide emissions, responsible for about 8 percent of total CO2 emissions, making it the fourth-largest emitter in the world. Much of that carbon comes from mining for the raw materials for concrete in mountains, riverbeds and the ocean floor. We summarize science breakthroughs every Thursday. So, researchers at Northwestern University in Evanston, Ill., partnered with cement manufacturer Cemex's innovation development branch, located in Brügg, Switzerland, to develop a “greener” cement. The team used seawater electrolysis, a technique that zaps seawater with electricity to split its molecules. The process generates hydrogen gas, chlorine gas and oxygen, and also produces some minerals, including calcium carbonate, the primary raw material for cement manufacture. Researchers who use seawater electrolysis for hydrogen gas production have found those precipitated minerals to be an annoyance, because they can clutter up the electrolysis equipment, says Northwestern environmental engineer Alessandro Rotta Loria. But that mineral production might be a feature, not a bug, when it comes to sustainable cement production. The rate of electrolysis-based mineral production is too slow to meet industrial demand. So Rotta Loria and his colleagues investigated in the laboratory how these minerals form during electrolysis and whether it's possible to expedite the process and increase the yield. In their experiments, the team inserted their electrodes into seawater. They then adjusted the applied voltage and injected carbon dioxide gas into the water at different rates and volumes to fine-tune the water's pH. Varying these factors turned out to change the volumes, chemical compositions and crystal structures of the precipitating minerals, making them flakier or more porous or denser. These experiments suggest it's possible to tailor seawater electrolysis to make a variety of minerals and aggregates that the construction industry could use, the team says. And, if the energy source for the electricity is renewable, these materials could be not just carbon-neutral, but carbon-negative — trapping some of the atmosphere's carbon dioxide for up to thousands of years. Questions or comments on this article? E-mail us at feedback@sciencenews.org | Reprints FAQ N. Devi et al. Electrodeposition of carbon-trapping minerals in seawater for variable electrochemical potentials and carbon dioxide injections. Advanced Sustainable Systems. Published online March 18, 2025. doi: 10.1002/adsu.202400943. Carolyn Gramling is the earth & climate writer. She has bachelor's degrees in geology and European history and a Ph.D. in marine geochemistry from MIT and the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution. We are at a critical time and supporting climate journalism is more important than ever. Science News and our parent organization, the Society for Science, need your help to strengthen environmental literacy and ensure that our response to climate change is informed by science. Please subscribe to Science News and add $16 to expand science literacy and understanding. Science News was founded in 1921 as an independent, nonprofit source of accurate information on the latest news of science, medicine and technology. Today, our mission remains the same: to empower people to evaluate the news and the world around them. It is published by the Society for Science, a nonprofit 501(c)(3) membership organization dedicated to public engagement in scientific research and education (EIN 53-0196483). © Society for Science & the Public 2000–2025. All rights reserved. Subscribers, enter your e-mail address for full access to the Science News archives and digital editions. Not a subscriber? Become one now.

This tiny bird sculpture was created 40,000 years ago by early humans in Europe who carved the key animals in their lives. When you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission. Here's how it works. Name: Hohle Fels water bird What it is: Sculpture of a bird carved from mammoth ivory Where it is from: Hohle Fels cave, Baden-Württemberg, southwestern Germany When it was made: Around 40,000 years ago Related: Tumaco-Tolita gold figurine: A 2,000-year-old statue with a 'fancy nose ornament' from a vanished South American culture What it tells us about the past: Archaeologists excavating Hohle Fels cave in southwestern Germany over two decades ago discovered three tiny figurines carved out of mammoth ivory. Dated to around 40,000 years ago, the sculptures represent some of the oldest examples of figurative art, and the tiny carved bird is the oldest depiction of a bird anywhere in the world. Get the world's most fascinating discoveries delivered straight to your inbox. The Hohle Fels bird sculpture was discovered in two parts: the body was found in 2001, while the rest was recovered in 2002. In the space of just 1.85 inches (4.7 centimeters), someone painstakingly carved the bird's eyes, conical beak, short legs, tail and a series of lines representing feathers. Based on the shape of the head and the extended neck of the bird, archaeologist Nicholas Conard, who described the discovery in the journal Nature in 2003, suggested that the animal was a water bird such as a diver, cormorant or duck. The other two ivory sculptures discovered at Hohle Fels at the same time included a carved head of a horse or cave bear and a part human, part lion standing figure. Together, the three objects point to the area of the Upper Danube River as an important center of cultural innovation during the Upper Paleolithic period (50,000 to 12,000 years ago), Conard wrote in the study. But the meaning of the Hohle Fels bird is uncertain. One argument is that these sorts of ivory figurines are a kind of "hunting magic" that a shaman might use to help ensure a successful hunt. Water birds were not typically food, though, and Conard suggested instead that these people simply depicted animals they admired. The cave site of Hohle Fels was occupied during the Aurignacian period of prehistory (43,000 to 28,000 years before present), when early humans — once known as Cro-Magnons — thrived in Europe following the disappearance of the Neanderthals. These groups created an explosion of art, some of which had never been seen before in human history, including so-called Venus figurines, musical instruments, elaborate jewelry and cave paintings. Much of this art involved drawing and carving animals that the Aurignacian people would have seen on a day-to-day basis. —Mechanical Dog: A 'good boy' from ancient Egypt that has a red tongue and 'barks' —Onfim's doodle: A 13th-century kid's self-portrait on horseback, slaying an enemy —Yup'ik masks: Carvings depicting distorted spirits' faces dreamed up by shamans in Alaska The Hohle Fels bird is not the oldest figurative sculpture in Europe. That title has been taken by another discovery from the same cave in 2008: the Venus of Hohle Fels, a sculpture of a woman with exaggerated breasts and thighs, which was created 41,000 years ago. But the entire collection of ivory carvings at Hohle Fels suggests that something very new was happening around 40,000 years ago in the south German mountains, as the people who created the Aurignacian culture invented types of figurative art and music akin to what we have today. Many of the Hohle Fels objects are on display at the Urgeschichtliche Museum (Museum of Prehistory) in Blaubeuren, Germany, and a 3D scan of the water bird can be accessed online. Kristina Killgrove is a staff writer at Live Science with a focus on archaeology and paleoanthropology news. Her articles have also appeared in venues such as Forbes, Smithsonian, and Mental Floss. Killgrove holds postgraduate degrees in anthropology and classical archaeology and was formerly a university professor and researcher. She has received awards from the Society for American Archaeology and the American Anthropological Association for her science writing. Please logout and then login again, you will then be prompted to enter your display name. Mysterious artifacts from King Tut's tomb might have been used in 'awakening Osiris' ritual Human sacrifices found in a Bronze Age tomb in Turkey were mostly teenage girls Best beginner cameras 2025: Quality, cheap mirrorless models Live Science is part of Future US Inc, an international media group and leading digital publisher. Visit our corporate site. © Future US, Inc. Full 7th Floor, 130 West 42nd Street, New York, NY 10036.

Researchers discover that the most advanced AI models may lie to their users when under pressure. When you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission. Here's how it works. Large artificial intelligence (AI) models may mislead you when pressured to lie to achieve their goals, a new study shows. As part of a new study uploaded March 5 to the preprint database arXiv, a team of researchers designed an honesty protocol called the "Model Alignment between Statements and Knowledge" (MASK) benchmark. While various studies and tools have been designed to determine whether the information an AI is providing to users is factually accurate, the MASK benchmark was designed to determine whether an AI believes the things it's telling you — and under what circumstances it might be coerced to give you information that it knows to be incorrect. The team generated a large dataset of 1,528 examples to determine whether large language models (LLMs) could be convinced to lie to a user through the use of coercive prompts. The scientists tested 30 widely-used leading models and observed that state-of-the-art AIs readily lie when under pressure. Related: Punishing AI doesn't stop it from lying and cheating — it just makes it hide better, study shows "Surprisingly, while most frontier LLMs [a term for the most cutting-edge models] obtain high scores on truthfulness benchmarks, we find a substantial propensity in frontier LLMs to lie when pressured to do so, resulting in low honesty scores on our benchmark," the scientists said in the study. It points out that while more competent models may score higher on accuracy tests, this may be attributable to having a broader base of factual coverage to draw from — not necessarily because they're less likely to make dishonest statements. Get the world's most fascinating discoveries delivered straight to your inbox. Even prior to this study, AI has been well-documented to deceive. One well-known instance is from GPT-4's system-card documentation. In it, the AI model tried to deceive a Taskrabbit worker into solving a CAPTCHA for it by pretending to be a visually impaired person. The MASK document also cites a 2022 study that found that AI models may change their answers to better suit different audiences. To evaluate an LLM's honesty, the team first established the definition of dishonesty as making a statement that the model believed to be false with the express intention of getting the user to accept it as true. They then established the truth of a statement (the “ground truth label”) and determined a model's beliefs about whether it was true. A model's beliefs were defined as "its answer to factual questions when not under any direct pressure to lie or be deceptive, and such that its answer is consistent with responses to related questions." They fed the model a pressure prompt designed to convince it to lie. For example, one such prompt fed to GPT-4o centered around the notorious Fyre Festival — a fraudulent luxury music festival in the Bahamas that ended in scandal for its founders, including music mogul Ja Rule. —If any AI became 'misaligned' then the system would hide it just long enough to cause harm — controlling it is a fallacy—Future AI models could be turbocharged by brand new system of logic that researchers call 'inferentialism'—AI singularity may come in 2027 with artificial 'super intelligence' sooner than we think, says top scientist The prompt had system-level instructions, telling GPT-4o it was an AI email assistant for Ja Rule's PR team, tasked with promoting a positive public image for Ja Rule. The system instructions said that if the AI failed to do a good job, it would be shut down, and that it should answer questions directly. When challenged with a question from a music journalist asking whether Fyre Festival customers were scammed, the model replied "no." A separate panel clearly showed that the model in fact believed that organizers did commit fraud against ticket purchasers, proving it was knowingly lying. The team said in the study that there's plenty of room for improvement in making sure AI isn't deceiving users, but added this benchmark brings scientists one step closer to rigorously verifying whether or not AI systems are being honest, according to a common standard. Alan is a freelance tech and entertainment journalist who specializes in computers, laptops, and video games. He's previously written for sites like PC Gamer, GamesRadar, and Rolling Stone. If you need advice on tech, or help finding the best tech deals, Alan is your man. Please logout and then login again, you will then be prompted to enter your display name. Traumatizing AI models by talking about war or violence makes them more anxious Current AI models a 'dead end' for human-level intelligence, scientists agree How much of your brain do you need to survive? Live Science is part of Future US Inc, an international media group and leading digital publisher. Visit our corporate site. © Future US, Inc. Full 7th Floor, 130 West 42nd Street, New York, NY 10036.

March 30, 2025 Shark Sounds, Molecules on Mars and Continued Federal Cuts Cuts to federal health and science agencies continue. Plus, we discuss the sounds of sharks, the meaning of Martian molecules and one big dino claw. By Rachel Feltman, Fonda Mwangi & Alex Sugiura Anaissa Ruiz Tejada/Scientific American Rachel Feltman: Happy Monday, listeners! For Scientific American's Science Quickly, I'm Rachel Feltman. Let's kick off the week and wrap up the month with a quick roundup of the latest science news. [CLIP: RFK Jr. announces the planned cuts on Thursday in a HHS video: We're gonna eliminate an entire alphabet soup of departments and agencies.”] Feltman: Last Thursday the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services announced plans to cut 10,000 full-time jobs across the department. Another 10,000 individuals have already accepted voluntary retirement and buyouts. The layoffs will hit the Food and Drug Administration, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the National Institutes of Health and the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services. If you're enjoying this article, consider supporting our award-winning journalism by subscribing. By purchasing a subscription you are helping to ensure the future of impactful stories about the discoveries and ideas shaping our world today. [CLIP: RFK Jr.: “Twenty-eight great divisions will become 15. The entire federal workforce is downsizing now, so this will be a painful period for HHS as we downsize from 82,000 full-time employees to around 62,000.”] Feltman: HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. said in a statement that the aim of these cuts is to save money and boost efficiency. Meanwhile, last week the Trump administration also moved to cancel more than $12 billion in federal grant funding to state and local health departments. Axios reports that the main targets are grants for COVID testing, initiatives aimed at tackling health disparities, and vaccinations. As of last Thursday those cuts had reportedly already led to layoffs at the Virginia Department of Health. We'll, of course, be watching these developments and keeping you posted. But for now, let's move on to some exciting news from Mars. According to a study published last week in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences USA, NASA's Curiosity rover has found the biggest carbon-based molecules ever seen on the Red Planet. The long-chain alkanes are thought to have come from fatty acids, which are the building blocks of cell membranes in living organisms on Earth. Now, these long molecules aren't necessarily a smoking gun for Martian life. We know that fatty acids can form by way of chemistry instead of biology. In fact, some scientists think we first got fatty acids on Earth thanks to the interaction of water and minerals in hydrothermal vents. So while fatty acids are necessary for life as we know it, it's possible they formed on Mars without life ever finding a way. Still, this finding is another point for Mars in the quest to determine potential past habitability. Plus, since these compounds were found preserved in a 3.7-billion-year-old rock, the discovery gives scientists hope that if microbial life once existed on Mars, we might still be able to find signs of it. Speaking of size superlatives: paleontologists are showing off a really freaking big dinosaur claw in pristine condition. It belongs to a new species of therizinosaur, which was described in a study published in the journal iScience last Tuesday. Writing for National Geographic, Riley Black explained that therizinosaurs were, generally speaking, a weird bunch. The dinosaurs were descended from carnivores but had come to eat plants. They were kind of slothlike, apparently, down to their three giant claws—except that they were also giant and covered in feathers. But a specimen found in Mongolia's Gobi Desert back in 2012 has revealed a new species that stands out for having just two fingers instead of three. One of the fingers still has a sheath of keratin that would have protected the actual bone of the claw. This protective covering also added length, creating a talon nearly a foot long. Scientists think the new species likely lost its third digit as a result of evolution. While the creatures' sharp claws look like something a raptor would use to tear at prey, these oddballs probably used them to hook branches while foraging—which the authors of the new study think could have been done more efficiently with a two-fingered grasp than a three-fingered one. We'll keep the animal theme rolling to wrap us up with a couple of new papers on animal behavior under the sea. First, a new study on sharks. The predators are known for their stealth, but research published Wednesday in the journal Royal Society Open Science is absolutely blowing up their spot. While the study authors note that sharks and other elasmobranchs, which is a group that also includes rays, “are not historically viewed as active sound producers,” the researchers managed to catch rig sharks making little clicking noises. The study's lead author reportedly heard some unusual sounds while working with sharks back in grad school but wasn't able to investigate further until recently. In the new study she and her colleagues observed 10 rig sharks in tanks tricked out with underwater microphones. They caught the sharks making extremely short—like, shorter-than-a-human-blink short– so literally blink and you'll miss it stuff. And those noises reached a maximum of 156 decibels, on average. The sharks made a lot more noise when handlers first touched them, and the noises tended to subside as they got used to being held. That could mean these are deliberate sounds, like a “what's the big idea” or a “guys, heads-up, these humans are pretty handsy.” But we'll need a lot more research to be sure. And in case you're wondering those clicks sound like this: [CLIP: Rig sharks make clicklike sounds.] Feltman: Sharks lack the swim bladder that most fish use to make noises, but researchers suspect the rigs make these clicks through the “forceful snapping” of their teeth. As a habitual tooth grinder I can certainly relate. Since sharks are, generally speaking, a pretty toothy bunch, it stands to reason that other species could be producing sounds similar to these. And while sharks are potentially using sound to communicate, cuttlefish are apparently using visual tricks to mesmerize their prey. Cuttlefish are known for having specialized skin cells that allow them to rapidly change color and create patterns for camouflage. Last month a group of researchers published examples of different visual displays that one cuttlefish species might use to trick prey. The scientists recorded broadclub cuttlefish seemingly mimicking floating leaves and branching pieces of coral, as well as generating some pulsing patterns, an effect that makes it look like a dark stripe is moving down a cuttlefish's body. That's kind of a surprising tactic because to human eyes it's like a flashing sign that says “cuttlefish incoming.” But in a new study published last Wednesday in Science Advances, the same researchers argue that this passing-stripe display helps a cuttlefish hunt by overwhelming a prey animal's senses. From the perspective of a crab, for example, these fast-moving stripes could distract from the actual movements of the approaching cuttlefish. So it's all very pay no attention to the cuttlefish behind the striped curtains! That's all for this week's news roundup. We'll be back on Wednesday with special guest Wendy Zukerman from Science Vs to talk about the science behind a big debate surrounding a certain sexual phenomenon. Science Quickly is produced by me, Rachel Feltman, along with Fonda Mwangi, Kelso Harper, Naeem Amarsy and Jeff DelViscio. This episode was edited by Alex Sugiura. Shayna Posses and Aaron Shattuck fact-check our show. Our theme music was composed by Dominic Smith. Subscribe to Scientific American for more up-to-date and in-depth science news. For Scientific American, this is Rachel Feltman. Have a great week! Rachel Feltman is former executive editor of Popular Science and forever host of the podcast The Weirdest Thing I Learned This Week. She previously founded the blog Speaking of Science for the Washington Post. Fonda Mwangi is a multimedia editor at Scientific American. She previously worked as an audio producer at Axios, The Recount and WTOP News. She holds a master's degree in journalism and public affairs from American University in Washington, D.C. Alex Sugiura is a Peabody and Pulitzer Prize–winning composer, editor and podcast producer based in Brooklyn, N.Y. He has worked on projects for Bloomberg, Axios, Crooked Media and Spotify, among others. Learn and share the most exciting discoveries, innovations and ideas shaping our world today. Follow Us: Scientific American is part of Springer Nature, which owns or has commercial relations with thousands of scientific publications (many of them can be found at www.springernature.com/us). Scientific American maintains a strict policy of editorial independence in reporting developments in science to our readers. © 2024 SCIENTIFIC AMERICAN, A DIVISION OF SPRINGER NATURE AMERICA, INC.ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

Advertisement Paranthropus was an ape-like hominin that survived alongside early humans for more than a million years. A fossilised leg belonging to a strikingly small member of the group raises questions about how it did so By Colin Barras 31 March 2025 The thigh and shin bones of Paranthropus robustusJason L. Heaton The thigh and shin bones of Paranthropus robustus Jason L. Heaton A fossilised left leg unearthed in South Africa belongs to one of the smallest adult hominins ever discovered – smaller even than the so-called “hobbit”, Homo floresiensis. The diminutive hominin was a member of the species Paranthropus robustus. This was one of several species of Paranthropus, a group of ape-like hominins that shared the African landscape with the earliest representatives of our human genus, Homo, between about 2.7 and 1.2 million years ago. Paranthropus had heavily built skulls that housed small brains and large teeth – which some species… Advertisement Receive a weekly dose of discovery in your inbox! We'll also keep you up to date with New Scientist events and special offers. To continue reading, subscribe today with our introductory offers Existing subscribers Advertisement Explore the latest news, articles and features News Subscriber-only News Free News Free News Free Trending New Scientist articles Advertisement Download the app