Humans
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This week, 773,000-year-old human remains found in Morocco may be the ancestors of Homo sapiens, the US is set to become the only country not part of the IPCC or the UNFCCC as Trump withdraws from multiple organizations that are trying to save the planet, and prehistoric hunter-gatherers in South Africa were using poison arrows 60,000 years ago. Finally, the US has just axed NASA’s Mars sample return mission, so what happens now?
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NASA To Bring Four Astronauts Home Early In First-Ever Medical Evacuation Of ISS
After announcing an astronaut had experienced an undisclosed medical situation, NASA yesterday made the unprecedented decision to shorten the mission and bring home all four Crew-11 members. This will be the first time in the history of the International Space Station (ISS) that a crew has had to come back down early for medical reasons. Read the full story here
"What We Have Is A Very Good Candidate": Has The Ancestor Of Homo Sapiens Finally Been Found In Africa?
A series of 773,000-year-old human remains in Morocco may represent a population of hominins that lived just as our own species split off from our sister lineages, the Neanderthals and the Denisovans. Discovered at a site near Casablanca, the prehistoric specimens could help to fill in one of the most significant gaps in the human family tree, providing an African ancestor at the very beginning of the modern human lineage. Read the full story here
Trump To Remove US From 66 International Organizations That Are Trying To Save The Planet
US President Donald Trump has signed an executive order that effectively withdraws the United States from 66 international organizations, including the United Nations’ Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), the International Law Commission, and the Global Counterterrorism Forum. The US will become the only country in the world not part of the IPCC or the United Nations Framework on Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC). Read the full story here
World’s Oldest Poison Arrows Were Used By Hunters 60,000 Years Ago
Prehistoric hunter-gatherers in South Africa applied deadly poisons to their stone arrows 60,000 years ago, pushing back the earliest known poison-laced weapons by over 50,000 years. Amazingly, the toxin they used is still employed by some Indigenous hunters in the region today, indicating a remarkably early origin for this ongoing lethal practice. Read the full story here
"Diet Stacking" Trend Could Be Seriously Bad For Your Health
Each new year, many people resolve to change their diets, and some decide explicitly to lose weight. But going too hard on our new regimens – and in particular, “diet stacking”, where multiple diet strategies are deployed at the same time – can be seriously bad for our health, according to a new study from researchers in Australia. Read the full story here
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Feature of the week:
US Just Killed NASA's Mars Sample Return Mission – So What Happens Now?
Congressional supporters of the Mars Sample Return (MSR) mission have buckled to pressure from the Trump administration to kill the centerpiece of NASA’s exploration plans over the next decade. Although the compromise bill released this week only officially covers this year’s expenditure, few people think the mission will be revived in the next few years. There have been enough signs this was likely, and contingency planning must be well underway, but so far, alternatives to the project remain uncertain. So what will happen to the Mars samples already collected on the Red Planet? Read the full story here
More content:
Have you seen our e-magazine, CURIOUS? Issue 42, January 2026, is available now. This month, we asked, “Why Do We Cry?” – check it out for exclusive interviews, book excerpts, long reads, and more.
PLUS, the We Have Questions podcast – an audio version of our coveted CURIOUS e-magazine column – continues. In episode 16, we ask, “How Did Frogs Become A Pregnancy Test For Humans?”
The Big Questions podcast season 5 has now concluded, but here’s one more bonus episode to help see you into 2026: Can Magic Be Used As A Tool In Science?. You can catch up on the whole of season 5 here.
