Since the 1990s, paleontologists have been pulling 125-million-year-old complete dinosaur skeletons from the rocks of the Lujiatun in Northwestern China, most seemingly posed in perfect .. show full overview
Since the 1990s, paleontologists have been pulling 125-million-year-old complete dinosaur skeletons from the rocks of the Lujiatun in Northwestern China, most seemingly posed in perfect rest. This has prompted comparisons to a famous archeological site where behavior is similarly well preserved: the site of Pompeii, a town crystallized by volcanic eruption almost 2000 years ago. But when you look into the details, it turns out their residents may have experienced very different final moments.
2025x3 The Strange Primates That Thrived In The Mountains Episode overview
Air date
Feb 11, 2025
Mountains have a unique effect on diversity, messing with our understanding of animals through time, and pretty much just making evolution weird. And they would eventually reveal .. show full overview
Mountains have a unique effect on diversity, messing with our understanding of animals through time, and pretty much just making evolution weird. And they would eventually reveal something even stranger about a group of mammals even closer to home: primates.
2025x4 Why Wasn't There A Second Age of Reptiles? Episode overview
Air date
Feb 25, 2025
An asteroid impact triggered the K-Pg mass extinction, wiping out the non-avian dinosaurs, ending the Age of Reptiles, and ushering in the Age of Mammals. But why was it the mammals who triumphed?
An asteroid impact triggered the K-Pg mass extinction, wiping out the non-avian dinosaurs, ending the Age of Reptiles, and ushering in the Age of Mammals. But why was it the mammals who triumphed?
2025x5 The Graveyard at the Center of the Earth Episode overview
Air date
Mar 11, 2025
Scientists have been trying to solve the mystery of why plate tectonics works the way it does for over a hundred years. And they might have just uncovered a key to cracking it.
Scientists have been trying to solve the mystery of why plate tectonics works the way it does for over a hundred years. And they might have just uncovered a key to cracking it.
2025x6 The Arms Race That Made Insects Take Flight Episode overview
Air date
Mar 25, 2025
Spiders and their ancestors have been driving an arms race that began before either stepped foot onto land and resulted in the first powered flight on Earth.
But how did this .. show full overview
Spiders and their ancestors have been driving an arms race that began before either stepped foot onto land and resulted in the first powered flight on Earth.
But how did this competition of webs versus wings drive such a massive evolutionary adaptation into an entirely new realm?
How did a relative of the red panda end up in North America? What can this tell us about how long ago – and how many times – North America was connected to Europe and Asia?
How did a relative of the red panda end up in North America? What can this tell us about how long ago – and how many times – North America was connected to Europe and Asia?
2025x8 The Rise and Fall of a Whale-Eating Sea Monster Episode overview
Air date
Apr 22, 2025
Unlike in fiction, giant whales do not emerge fully-formed from the ocean deep. So, where did Livyatan melvillei come from? How did such a large predator live? And what caused the titan .. show full overview
Unlike in fiction, giant whales do not emerge fully-formed from the ocean deep. So, where did Livyatan melvillei come from? How did such a large predator live? And what caused the titan to die out?
The answer may lie in an appetite so large, it may have eaten itself to extinction...
2025x9 There's An Invisible Ocean Between These Fossils Episode overview
Air date
May 06, 2025
This is the hundred-year tale of how an unlikely bunch of bottom-dwelling marine critters helped reveal that ocean basins are basically reincarnated every few hundred million years.
This is the hundred-year tale of how an unlikely bunch of bottom-dwelling marine critters helped reveal that ocean basins are basically reincarnated every few hundred million years.
After having solved the small matter of evolution by natural selection - becoming one of the most famous scientists in the world in the process - Charles Darwin turned his focus to a different personal obsession…
After having solved the small matter of evolution by natural selection - becoming one of the most famous scientists in the world in the process - Charles Darwin turned his focus to a different personal obsession…
How did sauropods, uniquely large land animals, actually live, with their anatomy and physiology pushed to such extremes? Well, their unprecedented gigantism came with some equally massive costs…
How did sauropods, uniquely large land animals, actually live, with their anatomy and physiology pushed to such extremes? Well, their unprecedented gigantism came with some equally massive costs…
2025x12 Why Paleontologists Can’t Stop Fighting About Spinosaurus Episode overview
Air date
Jul 01, 2025
What does it mean to be a “semi-aquatic” dinosaur? Was it wading in the shallows, or could it have been a skilled swimmer? Each scenario paints a very different picture of Spinosaurus, .. show full overview
What does it mean to be a “semi-aquatic” dinosaur? Was it wading in the shallows, or could it have been a skilled swimmer? Each scenario paints a very different picture of Spinosaurus, And the discovery of new fossils has paleontologists rethinking just how weird and watery this dinosaur was all over again.
One of the most surprising effects of the cascade of changes that played out in the wake of dinosaur extinction may have been the evolution of a world absolutely teeming with fruit. And with all that fruit, came a lot of fruit eaters.
One of the most surprising effects of the cascade of changes that played out in the wake of dinosaur extinction may have been the evolution of a world absolutely teeming with fruit. And with all that fruit, came a lot of fruit eaters.
While dino bones from the Late Triassic Period are few and far between, the other clues they left behind can reveal how this epic saga played out to those with the stomach to decipher .. show full overview
While dino bones from the Late Triassic Period are few and far between, the other clues they left behind can reveal how this epic saga played out to those with the stomach to decipher them.
Because, it turns out, the story of the rise of the dinosaurs is a tale written in puke and poop.
The Cretaceous Resinous Interval, a 54-million year period where amber was preserved in hundreds of locations across the world, was a gooey, gummy point in Earth's history - and then .. show full overview
The Cretaceous Resinous Interval, a 54-million year period where amber was preserved in hundreds of locations across the world, was a gooey, gummy point in Earth's history - and then amber suddenly disappeared for another 20 million years.
So, we have to ask: what exactly made this time period so very, very sticky?
Long before the rise of the great whites and hammerheads we know today, sharks and their cartilaginous relatives ruled Earth’s oceans and rivers in astonishing variety. It was the golden .. show full overview
Long before the rise of the great whites and hammerheads we know today, sharks and their cartilaginous relatives ruled Earth’s oceans and rivers in astonishing variety. It was the golden age of sharks.
But why did sharks get so incredibly diverse and odd during this period, only to lose most of that diversity forever?
2025x17 We're The Only Ones With Chins - And We Don't Know Why Episode overview
Air date
Oct 07, 2025
You share a trait with every single human who's ever lived – but no other animal on Earth has it.
It's not your big brain, or your opposable thumbs... it's actually this little shelf .. show full overview
You share a trait with every single human who's ever lived – but no other animal on Earth has it.
It's not your big brain, or your opposable thumbs... it's actually this little shelf on your face that we call a chin.
And here's the thing: we're not totally sure why it exists.
2025x18 Crawling Out Of The Water Was An Evolutionary Accident Episode overview
Air date
Oct 21, 2025
It’s beginning to look like our success on land, and that of all tetrapods, from frogs to dogs to dinosaurs, was just a lucky side-effect of fish trying to stay fish.
It’s beginning to look like our success on land, and that of all tetrapods, from frogs to dogs to dinosaurs, was just a lucky side-effect of fish trying to stay fish.
2025x19 How We Figured Out an Asteroid Killed the Dinosaurs Episode overview
Air date
Nov 04, 2025
66 million years ago a giant space rock crashed into our planet and killed the dinosaurs. In the span of just four decades, we’ve gone from not knowing there was a space rock at all to knowing exactly where that planet-killer came from.
66 million years ago a giant space rock crashed into our planet and killed the dinosaurs. In the span of just four decades, we’ve gone from not knowing there was a space rock at all to knowing exactly where that planet-killer came from.
66 million years ago, after an asteroid slammed into the Earth and wiped out the non-avian dinosaurs, the world became a dark wasteland. But among the survivors were two .. show full overview
66 million years ago, after an asteroid slammed into the Earth and wiped out the non-avian dinosaurs, the world became a dark wasteland. But among the survivors were two distantly-related groups of animals that, on the surface, seem to have nothing in common: tiny mammals and a group of lizard-like reptiles. They did share one important trait, though: the ability to chew their food. Really well. And it turns out, this strange ability might have helped them survive when the world almost ended.
2025x21 What Was Greenland Like When it Was Green Episode overview
Air date
Dec 02, 2025
It made the front page of the New York Times. Ancient DNA over 2 million years old, retrieved from the frozen dirt of Greenland. It reached back further in time than many scientists used .. show full overview
It made the front page of the New York Times. Ancient DNA over 2 million years old, retrieved from the frozen dirt of Greenland. It reached back further in time than many scientists used to think was even theoretically possible. And it contained the genetic ghost of an /entire ecosystem/ – one that has no counterpart in today’s world and one that we had /no idea/ even existed. It told of a time when Greenland was green…and how we might borrow genes from that ancient past to help us adapt to the future.
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