2025 News from the MPI of Geoanthropology

Before the ‘Out of Africa’ migration that led humans into Eurasia and beyond, new research shows that humans expanded their niche to include African forests and deserts. The authors argue that human populations learning to adapt to new and challenging habitats was key to the long-term success of this dispersal.
  more

New research traces the impact of climate change on language dispersal across Northeast Asia over the past 9,000 years more

A new study uses metabolic profiling to uncover ancient knowledge systems behind therapeutic and psychoactive plant use in ancient Arabia. more

A recent study published in iScience presents new insights into herding and land-use practices in the Lesser Caucasus during the Copper Age. Focusing on the high-altitude site of Yeghegis-1 in southern Armenia, the research reevaluates the long-standing views that mobile pastoralism played a central role in technological developments, resource procurement and trans-regional interactions in the region. more

The Group of Chief Scientific Advisors provides independent scientific advice and policy recommendations to the European Commission, informing decision-making and impacting EU legislation more

International researchers from a range of disciplines challenge long-held assumptions about one of the most transformative processes in human history more

A new book by Dr. Robert Spengler tackles one of the biggest questions in biology and the social sciences: domestication – what it is, how it occurred, and the role that humans really played in developing the first crops and livestock. more