In the News: Mammoth for Dinner?

Fig.1. Woolly mammoths (Mammuthus primigenius) in late Pleistocene landscape
(Credit: Mauricio Antón, 2004)

From ices cores to mammoth meat, this week is full of curiosities frozen in time. A return to these specimens reveals an important software error, a lesson in evolution, an answer to a decades-old question, and more:

• A curious tale of mammoth meat and extinct ground sloth on the menu is finally put to rest with the help of a specimen from the Yale Peabody Museum of Natural History: “The Explorers Club Once Served Mammoth At A Meal. Or Did It?” New York Times (03 February 2016)

• New fossils from China reveal a remarkable lesson in evolution, in which an extinct group of insects seems uncannily similar to modern butterflies: “Remarkable Butterfly Look-Alike Lived 50 Million Years Before Butterflies Appeared,” Smithsonian News (03 February 2016)

• An issue with incompatible software means that ancient human migration back into Africa may not have actually reached the western and central parts of the continent, as suggested by an October study: “Error Found In Study Of First Ancient African Genome,” Scientific American (29 January 2016)

• A dinosaur fossil collected in 1923 sheds light on the evolution of an efficient respiratory system that allows birds to fly high and over long distances: “Did Dinosaurs Breathe Like Birds?” AMNH News & Blogs (05 January 2016)