In a paper published in SCIENCE CHINA Earth Sciences, a team of researchers employed systematic archaeobotanical flotation and AMS radiocarbon dating at two sites in Romania: Baia-În Muchie and Dobrovăț. It provides valuable data on the chronology of millet cultivation in the SW Eastern European Plain and enhances our understanding of early East-West exchanges and their impact on human-environment interactions in critical regions.

A new study reveals that the Neolithic Revolution in the southern Levant may have been triggered by catastrophic wildfires and climate-driven soil erosion. Using charcoal records, isotopic data, and sediment analysis, the research identifies a natural tipping point around 8,200 years ago that forced early communities to adopt agriculture. Fertile soils formed in valley basins after hillslope degradation became hotspots for settlement and farming. The findings challenge the idea of a purely cultural or anthropogenic transition, pointing instead to climate-induced environmental collapse as a driving force.

Iron Age purple dye "factory" in Israel was in operation for almost 500 years, using mollusks in large-scale specialized manufacturing process

Natural and cultural resource management are conducted separately, despite the fact that climate change, sea level rise, and extreme weather threaten them both. Jayur Mehta and colleagues argue a synergy of both approaches is required to protect coastal archaeological landscapes.

We’re living in a period where the gap between rich and poor is dramatic, and it’s continuing to widen. But inequality is nothing new. In a new study published in the journal PNAS, researchers compared house size distributions from more than 1,000 sites around the world, covering the last 10,000 years. They found that while inequality is widespread throughout human history, it’s not inevitable, nor is it expressed to the same degree at every place and time.