Viking's silver treasure, an ancient Korean crown and three more discoveries
Throughout history, cultures have left behind a trail of breadcrumbs for archaeologists to follow. New sites and artifacts are found all the time, revealing forgotten secrets of the past.
Here are some of the latest discoveries:
1,400-year-old crown — still decorated with insect wings — found in South Korea
In Gyeongju, South Korea, archaeologists uncovered a 1,400-year-old crown adorned with jewel beetle wings from the Silla Kingdom. This ornate crown, found in a burial site, is a first-of-its-kind discovery in the region. The crown's intricate decorations, including gold beads and jade pieces, highlight the craftsmanship of the era. | Published May 22 | Read More |
Hobbyist studying old map notices odd mark that leads to medieval find in Sweden
In Derome, Sweden, a hobby archaeologist discovered the remains of a medieval monastery using an 18th-century map and modern technology. The site, likely dating back to the late 12th century, revealed thick walls and pillar foundations. This find sheds light on the region's monastic history and the Order of Cistercians. | Published May 22 | Read More |
Students locate ancient Roman army camp beyond empire's northern border. See it
In the Netherlands, university students discovered a rare ancient Roman military camp beyond the empire's northern border. Using computer models and LiDAR surveys, they confirmed the presence of Roman walls and a moat near Hoog Buurlo. | Published May 28 | Read More |
Viking-era silver treasures found on farm in Sweden and restored. See them shine
In Täby, Sweden, archaeologists unearthed a collection of Viking-era silver treasures, including arm rings, necklaces and coin pendants. The site, occupied for 500 years, also revealed structures from the Viking Age. The silver collection is notable for its size and preservation. | Published May 30 | Read More |
Ancient waste shows surprising 'luxury' food item was not only for Roman elite
In Pollentia, Mallorca, researchers found evidence of thrushes, a luxury food item, being sold by street vendors in ancient Rome. The discovery in a cesspit challenges the belief that thrushes were exclusive to elite banquets. This find suggests that thrushes were a common part of the urban diet in Roman times. | Published June 3 | Read More |
McClatchy News continues to follow the discovery of intriguing archaeological discoveries from around the globe. Check back to see the latest finds.
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Yahoo
a day ago
- Yahoo
QUBT Stock Surges on Rise in Real-World Adoption: More Upside Ahead?
Quantum Computing Inc. QUBT is gaining commercial momentum with its Dirac-3 quantum optimization system being used in practical, real-world settings across key sectors. In biomedical research, QUBT is working with the Sanders Tri-Institutional Therapeutics Discovery Institute, a partnership involving Sloan Kettering, Rockefeller University and Weill Cornell Medicine, to support computational chemistry and biomolecular modeling. In aerospace and Earth sciences, QUBT has expanded its collaboration with NASA through a subcontract with Analytics Mechanics Associates. Dirac-3 will help improve LiDAR data processing by removing sunlight interference, aiding NASA's daytime Earth observation efforts. In industrial R&D, Quantum Computing sold its EmuCore reservoir computing device to a major automotive manufacturer for research applications, signaling growing interest from commercial players exploring quantum-powered AI and simulation tools. These examples demonstrate that QUBT's quantum systems are already in use, providing real-world value in optimization and sensing across multiple industries, far beyond just future potential. How are QUBT Peers Positioned Now? IonQ IONQ: It continues to lead in trapped-ion quantum computing, backed by strong investor confidence and growing commercial traction. IonQ is expanding its ecosystem through acquisitions like ID Quantique and Qubitekk, and partnerships with organizations such as Einride, the U.S. Air Force and KISTI. These highlight its progress across quantum computing, networking and sensing applications. Rigetti Computing RGTI: It is strengthening its position in superconducting quantum computing with the launch of Ankaa-3, an 84-qubit system achieving 99.5% two-qubit gate fidelity and demonstrating scalable error reduction. Rigetti continues to collaborate with government agencies, including DARPA's Quantum Benchmarking Initiative, reinforcing its role in advancing hardware and modular quantum architectures. QUBT's Price Performance Quantum Computing has rallied 137.7% in the past three months compared with the industry's 26% growth and the sector's 24.6% rise. The S&P 500 index, meanwhile, has improved 15.6% during the said period. Three-Month Share Price Comparison: QUBT Image Source: Zacks Investment Research Average Target Price Shows Near-term Upside Based on short-term price targets, Quantum Computing is currently trading 5.9% below its average Zacks price target. Image Source: Zacks Investment Research QUBT currently carries a Zacks Rank #3 (Hold). You can see the complete list of today's Zacks #1 Rank (Strong Buy) stocks here. Want the latest recommendations from Zacks Investment Research? Today, you can download 7 Best Stocks for the Next 30 Days. Click to get this free report Quantum Computing Inc. (QUBT) : Free Stock Analysis Report IonQ, Inc. (IONQ) : Free Stock Analysis Report Rigetti Computing, Inc. (RGTI) : Free Stock Analysis Report This article originally published on Zacks Investment Research ( Zacks Investment Research Sign in to access your portfolio
CNN
2 days ago
- CNN
Fossils unearthed in Grand Canyon reveal new details of evolutionary explosion of life
Paleontologists have discovered remarkable fossils in the Grand Canyon that reveal fresh details about the emergence of complex life half a billion years ago. The newfound remains of fauna from the region suggest that it offered ideal conditions for life to flourish and diversify, in a 'Goldilocks zone' between harsh extremes elsewhere. This evolutionary opportunity produced a multitude of early animals, including oddballs with peculiar adaptations for survival, according to new research. During the Cambrian explosion, which played out in the coastal waters of Earth's oceans about 540 million years ago, most animal body types that exist today emerged in a relatively short time span, scientists believe. Back then, the Grand Canyon was closer to the equator, and the region was covered by a warm, shallow sea teeming with burgeoning life — aquatic creatures resembling modern-day shrimp, pill bugs and slugs — all developing new ways to exploit the abundant resources. Researchers turned to the Grand Canyon's layers of sedimentary rock to unlock secrets of this pivotal moment in the history of life, digging into the flaky, claylike shale of the Bright Angel Formation where most of the canyon's Cambrian-era fossils have been found. The study team expected to recover mostly the fossilized remains of hard-shelled invertebrates typical of the region. Instead, the team unearthed something unusual: rocks containing well-preserved internal fragments of tiny soft-bodied mollusks, crustaceans, and priapulids, also known as penis worms. 'With these kinds of fossils, we can better study their morphology, their appearance, and their lifestyle in much greater resolution, which is not possible with the shelly parts,' said Giovanni Mussini, the first author of the study published Wednesday in the journal Science Advances. 'It's a new kind of window on Cambrian life in the Grand Canyon.' Using high-powered microscopes, the team was able to investigate innovations such as miniature chains of teeth from rock-scraping mollusks and the hairy limbs and molars of filter-feeding crustaceans, providing a rare look into the biologically complex ways Cambrian animals adapted to capture and eat prey. For most of the planet's 4 billion-year history, simplicity reigned. Single-celled microbes remained stationary on the ocean floor, thriving on chemical compounds such as carbon dioxide and sulfur molecules to break down food. What changed? Scientists still debate what drove the Cambrian explosion, but the most popular theory is that oxygen in the Earth's atmosphere slowly began to increase about 550 million years ago, said Erik Sperling, an associate professor of Earth and planetary sciences at Stanford University. Oxygen provided a much more efficient way to metabolize food, giving animals more energy to mobilize and hunt for prey, suggested Sperling, who was not involved in the new study. 'The (emergence of) predators kicked off these escalatory arms races, and then we basically got the explosion of different ways of doing business,' Sperling said. During the Cambrian, the shallow sea covering the Grand Canyon was especially oxygen-rich thanks to its perfect, 'Goldilocks' depth, said Mussini, a doctoral student in Earth sciences at the University of Cambridge in the United Kingdom. Ranging from 40 to 50 meters (about 130 to 165 feet) in depth, the ecosystem was undisturbed by the shoreline's constant waves shifting around sediments, and sunlight was still able to reach photosynthesizing plants on the seafloor that could provide oxygen. The abundance of food and favorable environmental conditions meant that animals could take more evolutionary risks to stay ahead of their competition, Mussini said. 'In a more resource-starved environment, animals can't afford to make that sort of physiological investment,' Mussini said in a news release from the University of Cambridge. 'It's got certain parallels with economics: invest and take risks in times of abundance; save and be conservative in times of scarcity.' Many soft-bodied fossil finds before this one have come from regions with harsh environments such as Canada's Burgess Shale formation and China's Maotianshan Shales, noted Susannah Porter, a professor of Earth science at the University of California in Santa Barbara who was not involved in the study. 'It's not unlike if paleontologists far in the future only had great fossil records from Antarctica, where harsh cold environments forced people to adapt. … But then found great human fossils in New York City, where people flourished,' Porter explained. 'We have an opportunity to see different sorts of evolutionary pressures that aren't like, it's really cold, it's really hot, there's not a lot of water.' While some of the feeding mechanisms uncovered in the Grand Canyon fossils are still around today, others are much more alien. Among the most freakish: penis worms that turned their mouths inside out, revealing a throat lined with hairy teeth. The worms, also known as cactus worms, are mostly extinct today, but were widespread during the Cambrian. The fossilized worm found in the Grand Canyon represents a previously unknown species. Due to its relatively large size — about 3.9 inches (10 centimeters) — and distinct teeth, it was named Kraytdraco spectatus, after the fictional krayt dragon from the Star Wars universe, Mussini said. This particular penis worm appears to have had a gradient of hundreds of branching teeth used to sweep food into their extendable mouths. 'It's a bit hard to understand how exactly it was feeding,' Mussini said. 'But it was probably eating debris on the seafloor, scraping it away with some of the most robust teeth that it had, and then using these other, more delicate teeth to filter and retain it within this long, tube-like mouth.' Rows of tiny molars, sternal parts and comblike limbs that once belonged to crustaceans were also among the findings, which all date back 507 million to 502 million years. Similar to today's brine shrimp, the crustaceans used these fine-haired limbs to capture floating food from the water and bring it to the mouth, where molars would then grind down the particles, Mussini explained. Nestled among the molars, researchers even found a few unlucky plankton. Other creatures resembling their modern counterparts included sluglike mollusks. The fossils revealed chains of teeth that likely helped them scrape algae or bacteria from along the seafloor. 'For each of these animals, there's different components, but most of what we found directly relates to the way these animals were processing their food, which is one of the most exciting parts, because it tells us a lot about their lifestyle, and as a consequence, their ecological implications,' Mussini said. Sign up for CNN's Wonder Theory science newsletter. Explore the universe with news on fascinating discoveries, scientific advancements and more.
CNN
2 days ago
- CNN
Evolution ran wild 500 million years ago in the friendly waters of the Grand Canyon, study suggests
Ancient creatures Animal storiesFacebookTweetLink Paleontologists have discovered remarkable fossils in the Grand Canyon that reveal fresh details about the emergence of complex life half a billion years ago. The newfound remains of fauna from the region suggest that it offered ideal conditions for life to flourish and diversify, in a 'Goldilocks zone' between harsh extremes elsewhere. This evolutionary opportunity produced a multitude of early animals, including oddballs with peculiar adaptations for survival, according to new research. During the Cambrian explosion, which played out in the coastal waters of Earth's oceans about 540 million years ago, most animal body types that exist today emerged in a relatively short time span, scientists believe. Back then, the Grand Canyon was closer to the equator, and the region was covered by a warm, shallow sea teeming with burgeoning life — aquatic creatures resembling modern-day shrimp, pill bugs and slugs — all developing new ways to exploit the abundant resources. Researchers turned to the Grand Canyon's layers of sedimentary rock to unlock secrets of this pivotal moment in the history of life, digging into the flaky, claylike shale of the Bright Angel Formation where most of the canyon's Cambrian-era fossils have been found. The study team expected to recover mostly the fossilized remains of hard-shelled invertebrates typical of the region. Instead, the team unearthed something unusual: rocks containing well-preserved internal fragments of tiny soft-bodied mollusks, crustaceans, and priapulids, also known as penis worms. 'With these kinds of fossils, we can better study their morphology, their appearance, and their lifestyle in much greater resolution, which is not possible with the shelly parts,' said Giovanni Mussini, the first author of the study published Wednesday in the journal Science Advances. 'It's a new kind of window on Cambrian life in the Grand Canyon.' Using high-powered microscopes, the team was able to investigate innovations such as miniature chains of teeth from rock-scraping mollusks and the hairy limbs and molars of filter-feeding crustaceans, providing a rare look into the biologically complex ways Cambrian animals adapted to capture and eat prey. For most of the planet's 4 billion-year history, simplicity reigned. Single-celled microbes remained stationary on the ocean floor, thriving on chemical compounds such as carbon dioxide and sulfur molecules to break down food. What changed? Scientists still debate what drove the Cambrian explosion, but the most popular theory is that oxygen in the Earth's atmosphere slowly began to increase about 550 million years ago, said Erik Sperling, an associate professor of Earth and planetary sciences at Stanford University. Oxygen provided a much more efficient way to metabolize food, giving animals more energy to mobilize and hunt for prey, suggested Sperling, who was not involved in the new study. 'The (emergence of) predators kicked off these escalatory arms races, and then we basically got the explosion of different ways of doing business,' Sperling said. During the Cambrian, the shallow sea covering the Grand Canyon was especially oxygen-rich thanks to its perfect, 'Goldilocks' depth, said Mussini, a doctoral student in Earth sciences at the University of Cambridge in the United Kingdom. Ranging from 40 to 50 meters (about 130 to 165 feet) in depth, the ecosystem was undisturbed by the shoreline's constant waves shifting around sediments, and sunlight was still able to reach photosynthesizing plants on the seafloor that could provide oxygen. The abundance of food and favorable environmental conditions meant that animals could take more evolutionary risks to stay ahead of their competition, Mussini said. 'In a more resource-starved environment, animals can't afford to make that sort of physiological investment,' Mussini said in a news release from the University of Cambridge. 'It's got certain parallels with economics: invest and take risks in times of abundance; save and be conservative in times of scarcity.' Many soft-bodied fossil finds before this one have come from regions with harsh environments such as Canada's Burgess Shale formation and China's Maotianshan Shales, noted Susannah Porter, a professor of Earth science at the University of California in Santa Barbara who was not involved in the study. 'It's not unlike if paleontologists far in the future only had great fossil records from Antarctica, where harsh cold environments forced people to adapt. … But then found great human fossils in New York City, where people flourished,' Porter explained. 'We have an opportunity to see different sorts of evolutionary pressures that aren't like, it's really cold, it's really hot, there's not a lot of water.' While some of the feeding mechanisms uncovered in the Grand Canyon fossils are still around today, others are much more alien. Among the most freakish: penis worms that turned their mouths inside out, revealing a throat lined with hairy teeth. The worms, also known as cactus worms, are mostly extinct today, but were widespread during the Cambrian. The fossilized worm found in the Grand Canyon represents a previously unknown species. Due to its relatively large size — about 3.9 inches (10 centimeters) — and distinct teeth, it was named Kraytdraco spectatus, after the fictional krayt dragon from the Star Wars universe, Mussini said. This particular penis worm appears to have had a gradient of hundreds of branching teeth used to sweep food into their extendable mouths. 'It's a bit hard to understand how exactly it was feeding,' Mussini said. 'But it was probably eating debris on the seafloor, scraping it away with some of the most robust teeth that it had, and then using these other, more delicate teeth to filter and retain it within this long, tube-like mouth.' Rows of tiny molars, sternal parts and comblike limbs that once belonged to crustaceans were also among the findings, which all date back 507 million to 502 million years. Similar to today's brine shrimp, the crustaceans used these fine-haired limbs to capture floating food from the water and bring it to the mouth, where molars would then grind down the particles, Mussini explained. Nestled among the molars, researchers even found a few unlucky plankton. Other creatures resembling their modern counterparts included sluglike mollusks. The fossils revealed chains of teeth that likely helped them scrape algae or bacteria from along the seafloor. 'For each of these animals, there's different components, but most of what we found directly relates to the way these animals were processing their food, which is one of the most exciting parts, because it tells us a lot about their lifestyle, and as a consequence, their ecological implications,' Mussini said. Sign up for CNN's Wonder Theory science newsletter. Explore the universe with news on fascinating discoveries, scientific advancements and more.
