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An ancient tree that contains a record of a reversal of Earth's magnetic field has been discovered in New Zealand. The tree -- an Agathis australis, better known as its M&Ccedilori name kauri -- was found in Ngawha, on New Zealand's North Island, during excavation work for the expansion of a geothermal power plant, stuff.nz reports. The tree, which had been buried in 26 feet of soil, measures eight feet in diameter and 65 feet in length. Carbon dating revealed it lived for 1,500 years, between 41,000 and 42,500 years ago... The lifespan of the kauri tree covers a point...

The deepest layers of carbon-14 dated ice found in the Col du Dôme of the Mont Blanc glacier in the French Alps provide a record of atmospheric conditions in the ancient Roman era. Published in Geophysical Research Letters, the study, led by an international team and coordinated by a CNRS scientist at the Institute for Geosciences and Environmental Research (IGE)(CNRS/IRD/UGA/Grenoble INP)*, reveals significant atmospheric pollution from heavy metals: the presence of lead and antimony (detected in ancient alpine ice for the first time here) is linked to mining activity and lead and silver production by the ancient Romans, well before...

Along the Black River in North Carolina, bald cypress trees have been quietly growing for millennia. Quite literally so: Scientists recently found trees over 2,000 years old - including one that is at least 2,624 years old. Another nearby tree was found to be 2,088 years old - and geoscientists believe that more bald cypresses (Taxodium distichum) in the Three Sisters Swamp could be the same age or even older. Surprisingly, a tree named BLK227 was found to be at least 2,624 years old. That makes it a seedling or sapling in 605 BCE - a timeframe that predates the...

For a long time it was believed that a giant rhinoceros called Elasmotherium sibericum went extinct around 200,000 years ago — well before the Quaternary megafaunal extinction event, which saw the end of the woolly mammoth, Irish elk and saber-toothed cat. Now improved dating of fossils suggests that the species survived in Eastern Europe and Central Asia until at least 39,000 years ago, overlapping in time with the existence of early modern humans. Today there are just five surviving rhinoceros species, although in the past there have been as many as 250 species at different times.Weighing up to 3.5 tons, Elasmotherium...

A giant rhino that may have been the origin of the unicorn myth survived until at least 39,000 years ago - much longer than previously thought. Known as the Siberian unicorn, the animal had a long horn on its nose, and roamed the grasslands of Eurasia. New evidence shows the hefty beast may have eventually died out because it was such a picky eater. Scientists say knowing more about the animal's extinction could help save the remaining rhinos on the planet. Rhinos are in particular danger of extinction because they are very picky about their habitat, said Prof Adrian Lister...

The tip of a bone point fragment found embedded in a mastodon rib from an archaeological site in Washington state shows that hunters were present in North America at least 800 years before Clovis, confirming that the first inhabitants arrived earlier to North America than previously thought, says a team of researchers led by a Texas A&M University archaeologist. Michael Waters, director of the Center for the Study of the First Americans in the Department of Anthropology at Texas A&M, and colleagues from Colorado, Washington and Denmark believe the find at the Manis site in Washington demonstrates that humans were...

Visitors to a small log cabin in Kentucky are right to ask: Is it true that Abraham Lincoln slept here? On the eve of Lincoln's 209th birthday tomorrow, Brook Silva-Braga has the answer... "What we're trying to do is authenticate when this cabin was made by using the tree rings in the logs," he replied. Some say our 16th president, born in these hills in 1809, spent some of his childhood in this cabin at Knob Creek. But did he?... So no, Abraham Lincoln did not sleep here in the Knob Creek cabin … or in the "symbolic cabin" at...

Carbon-14 in diamonds: Refuting Talk.Origins Published: 12 November 2016 (GMT+10) C S from United States wrote in: ""I was looking at talk origins’ little archive on Diamonds and C14 in summary. They say Radioisotope evidence presents significant problems for the young earth position. Baumgardner and the RATE team are to be commended for tackling the subject, but their “intrinsic radiocarbon” explanation does not work. The previously published radiocarbon AMS measurements can generally be explained by contamination, mostly due to sample chemistry. The RATE coal samples were probably contaminated in situ. RATE’s processed diamond samples were probably contaminated in the sample...

Oldest noodles unearthed in China Late Neolithic noodles: They may settle the origin debate The 50cm-long, yellow strands were found in a pot that had probably been buried during a catastrophic flood. Radiocarbon dating of the material taken from the Lajia archaeological site on the Yellow River indicates the food was about 4,000 years old. Scientists tell the journal Nature that the noodles were made using grains from millet grass - unlike modern noodles, which are made with wheat flour. The discovery goes a long way to settling the old argument over who first created the string-like food. Professor Houyuan...

Skulls and other human bones poke from large ceramic jars at Khnorng Sroal, one of the newly dated mountainside burials in southwestern Cambodia's Cardamom Mountains. The bones were placed in the 20-inch-tall (50-centimeter-tall) body jars only after the bodies had decomposed or had been picked clean by scavenging animals, according to the study, which is published in the latest issue of the journal Radiocarbon. "The Cardamom highlanders may have used some form of exposure of the body to de-flesh the bones, like the 'sky burials' known in other cultures," study leader Beavan said. Placing the sky-high burials couldn't have been...

Disability snuff film, ‘Me Before You’ God help the most vulnerable in a society where the lib-left and Hollywood flagrantly extol the ‘Better Dead Than Disabled’ meme with a real life Parliament echoing the message of the soon to be released “disability snuff film”, ‘Me Before You’. “Me Before You” is the latest Hollywood blockbuster to grossly misrepresent the lived experience of the majority of disabled people. In the film, a young man becomes disabled, falls in love with his ‘carer’ and they have an incredible 6 months together. Despite her opposition, however, our hero does the “honorable” thing by...

Scientists from the University of Oxford and the University of Manchester have used a new technique, "Zooarchaeology by Mass Spectrometry," or ZooMS, to identify more than 2,000 bone fragments recovered from Russia's Denisova Cave. ZooMS analyzes the collagen peptide sequences in bone, which can then be used to identify its species. Among the remains of mammoths, woolly rhino, wolf, and reindeer, the researchers found one Neanderthal bone. "When the ZooMS results showed that there was a human fingerprint among the bones I was extremely excited. ...The bone itself is not exceptional in any way and would otherwise be missed by...

After nine months of tests, researchers in France have identified the head of France's King Henry IV, who was assassinated in 1610 aged 57. The scientific tests helped identify the late monarch's embalmed head, which was shuffled between private collections ever since it disappeared during the French Revolution in 1793. The results of the research identifying Henry IV's head were published online Wednesday in the medical journal, BMJ. Henry IV was buried in the Basilica of Saint Denis near Paris, but during the frenzy of the French Revolution, the royal graves were dug up and revolutionaries chopped off Henry's head,...

Enlarge Image Nuclear fallout. Radioactive carbon-14 atoms released by atomic bombs are helping scientists determine the birthdays of new neurons in the hippocampus (inset). Credit: Spalding et al., Cell (2013);(inset) Weissman, Livet, Sanes, and Lichtman/Harvard University The mushroom clouds produced by more than 500 nuclear bomb tests during the Cold War may have had a silver lining, after all. More than 50 years later, scientists have found a way to use radioactive carbon isotopes released into the atmosphere by nuclear testing to settle a long-standing debate in neuroscience: Does the adult human brain produce new neurons? After working to...

It appeared to be one of archaeology's most sensational finds. The skull fragment discovered in a peat bog near Hamburg was more than 36,000 years old - and was the vital missing link between modern humans and Neanderthals. This, at least, is what Professor Reiner Protsch von Zieten - a distinguished, cigar-smoking German anthropologist - told his scientific colleagues, to global acclaim, after being invited to date the extremely rare skull. However, the professor's 30-year-old academic career has now ended in disgrace after the revelation that he systematically falsified the dates on this and numerous other "stone age" relics. Yesterday...

History of modern man unravels as German scholar is exposed as fraud Flamboyant anthropologist falsified dating of key discoveries Luke Harding in Berlin Saturday February 19, 2005 The Guardian It appeared to be one of archaeology's most sensational finds. The skull fragment discovered in a peat bog near Hamburg was more than 36,000 years old - and was the vital missing link between modern humans and Neanderthals. This, at least, is what Professor Reiner Protsch von Zieten - a distinguished, cigar-smoking German anthropologist - told his scientific colleagues, to global acclaim, after being invited to date the extremely rare skull....

Panel says professor of human origins made up data, plagiarized works A flamboyant anthropology professor, whose work had been cited as evidence Neanderthal man once lived in Northern Europe, has resigned after a German university panel ruled he fabricated data and plagiarized the works of his colleagues. Reiner Protsch von Zieten, a Frankfurt university panel ruled, lied about the age of human skulls, dating them tens of thousands of years old, even though they were much younger, reports Deutsche Welle. "The commission finds that Prof. Protsch has forged and manipulated scientific facts over the past 30 years," the university said...

Disgraced Anthropologist Drinks 40,000-Year-Old Milk by Scott Ott (2005-02-19) -- A disgraced German anthropology professor, who pretended to use carbon dating to establish a link between Neanderthals and modern man, told reporters today that he regularly drinks 40,000-year-old milk and drives a Porsche Carrera made in 736 BC. Frankfurt Professor Reiner Protsch von Zieten resigned this week from a 30-year career as one of the world's leading anthropologists, when a panel concluded his carbon dating of human bones was incorrect by thousands of years. The inquiry found that one skull, which Mr. Protsch claimed came from a 27,400-year-old human fossil,...

A flamboyant anthropology professor, whose work had been cited as evidence Neanderthal man once lived in Northern Europe, has resigned after a German university panel ruled he fabricated data and plagiarized the works of his colleagues. Reiner Protsch von Zieten, a Frankfurt university panel ruled, lied about the age of human skulls, dating them tens of thousands of years old, even though they were much younger, reports Deutsche Welle. "The commission finds that Prof. Protsch has forged and manipulated scientific facts over the past 30 years," the university said of the widely recognized expert in carbon data in a prepared...

Neanderthal Man 'never walked in northern Europe' By Tony Paterson in Berlin (Filed: 22/08/2004) Historians of the Stone Age fear that they will have to rip up their theories about Neanderthal Man after doubt has been cast on the carbon dating of skeletons by a leading German anthropologist. Work by the flamboyant Professor Reiner Protsch von Zieten showed that Neanderthal Man existed in northern Europe. Calculations on skeletal remains found at Hahnofersand, near Hamburg, stated they were 36,000 years old. Yet recent research at Oxford University's carbon-dating laboratory has suggested that they date back a mere 7,500 years. By that...