A new study suggests that a series of environmental changes in East Africa some 320,000 years ago challenged a previous long-standing way of life for proto-humans, and produced a more adaptable culture.

Fish bones reveal the seasonal fishing patterns of Patagonians thousands of years ago, illustrating how prehistoric communities adapted to their environments.

Artifacts from a receding ice patch provide a glimpse of Iron Age and Viking activity along a mountain pass.

In a new study, scientists use urine salts to reconstruct the timing and scale of the Neolithic revolution at a Turkish archaeological site.

East Africa’s rift valley is considered by many to be the cradle of humanity. In the Turkana region of northwest Kenya, researchers Christopher Lepre and Tanzhuo Liu of Columbia University’s Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory are cooperating with colleagues to study questions of human evolution, from the creation of the earliest stone tools to climate swings that have affected developing civilizations.

Who were our earliest ancestors? How and when did they evolve into modern humans? And how do we define “human,” anyway? Scientists are exploring Kenya’s Lake Turkana basin to help answer these questions.

We are high mountain people, hunters and artists,
Our view from this base camp is brilliant and clear.
Cold, thin air sweeps the rocky plateau;
You need a strong heart to live here.

On a man in the mountains, dusk falls;
Shadows seep upward and spread.
Scaling the black, chiseled walls,
He silently seeks the dead.