Neanderthals in the News

[zorkan]

If they were fossil collectors did they try the sport of fishing?
They might have been interested more in flower arranging than combative sport.
One reason given for why they died out.

[Recusant]

Though the interesting archaeology of Grotte Mandrin have been mentioned previously in this thread, I came across a podcast about it, which prompted me to follow up. I found an article in the Smithsonian magazine on the topic, connecting it with discoveries elsewhere.

"54,000 Years Ago, Humans and Neanderthals May Have Inhabited Europe Together" | Smithsonian

Grotte Mandrin isn't an extensive cave; it's just a deep overhang in southern France that provides protection from the elements. But the shelter nestled inside a rock outcropping has wide views over a Rhône Valley once teeming with deer, bison and horses. So Neanderthals found the location attractive enough to call it home, seasonally at least, for tens of thousands of years. And they weren't the only species to move in. A broken molar and sophisticated stone points suggest that Europe's first known humans may have lived here 54,000 years ago, subsequently alternating occupation with Neanderthals during thousands of years of European prehistory.

Now the striking similarities between these finds and tools from the Near East, published Wednesday in PLOS One, have made Grotte Mandrin the epicenter of an intriguing theory that could write new chapters in the story of how humans inhabited Europe, and what their arrival meant for the continent's Neanderthal inhabitants.

The provocative new theory suggests modern humans colonized Europe in three distinct waves of migration from the Near East, interacting with Neanderthals intermittently for thousands of years while they attempted to gain a foothold. French archaeologist Ludovic Slimak believes that sophisticated stone tools found in France were produced by systematic technical methods so similar to those seen among Homo sapiens in Lebanon that they must have come from the same culture.

The comparisons of thousands of tools—and a single surprising human tooth—led Slimak to theorize that human migrations from the Near East began about 10,000 years earlier than previously thought. And because tool technologies went through three very similar phases in each region, Slimak believes that they were spread from the Near East to Europe during three distinct waves of migration. It was only after the third wave some 45,000 to 42,000 years ago, he suggests, that Neanderthals began to fade into extinction.

[Continues . . .]

The paper is open access:

"The three waves: Rethinking the structure of the first Upper Paleolithic in Western Eurasia" | PLOS One

Abstract:

The Neronian is a lithic tradition recognized in the Middle Rhône Valley of Mediterranean France now directly linked to Homo sapiens and securely dated to 54,000 years ago (ka), pushing back the arrival of modern humans in Europe by 10 ka. This incursion of modern humans into Neandertal territory and the relationships evoked between the Neronian and the Levantine Initial Upper Paleolithic (IUP) question the validity of concepts that define the first H. sapiens migrations and the very nature of the first Upper Paleolithic in western Eurasia.

Direct comparative analyses between lithic technology from Grotte Mandrin and East Mediterranean archeological sequences, especially Ksar Akil, suggest that the three key phases of the earliest Levantine Upper Paleolithic have very precise technical and chronological counterparts in Western Europe, recognized from the Rhône Valley to Franco-Cantabria. These trans-Mediterranean technical connections suggest three distinct waves of H. sapiens expansion into Europe between 55–42 ka. These elements support an original thesis on the origin, structure, and evolution of the first moments of the Upper Paleolithic in Europe tracing parallel archaeological changes in the East Mediterranean region and Europe.

[Recusant]

If the findings described below are accurate, it appears that Neanderthals were doing hand stencils on subterranean walls before any modern humans got into the act.

"Neanderthals were making hand stencil rock art more than 66,000 years ago, U-series dating suggests" | Phys.org

A discovery deep within a cave in Spain has challenged the history of human artistic expression. Researchers have determined that hand stencils in Maltravieso Cave are more than 66,000 years old, suggesting that Neanderthals, not modern humans, were the world's first artists.

Stencils and prints of the human hand are some of the earliest forms of deliberately created visual artwork preserved in the archaeological record. Maltravieso Cave houses more than 60 red hand stencils, but their precise ages have remained a mystery.

Determining the age of cave art is usually challenging because mineral-based pigments cannot be dated using carbon dating methods.

[. . .]

Isotopes of uranium decay into thorium at a set rate, which makes U-series dating suitable for samples ranging from a few hundred to around 500,000 years. On the surface, the soil has a mixture of uranium and thorium isotopes with no way to distinguish which thorium has decayed from what uranium isotope, making exposed soil impossible to date.

When it rains, only the uranium is water soluble, hitching a ride in the water while leaving the thorium in place. Surface water often works its way into underground caves, leaching in from the surface above.

The water brings with it an assortment of soluble minerals, including the uranium isotopes, that form calcium carbonate crusts when the water evaporates, building up over time to create cemented sediments.

It is within the layers of calcium carbonate that the conversion of uranium to thorium can be measured in isolation, ticking away like a clock over thousands of years. By analyzing the uranium-to-thorium ratio of calcium carbonate crusts that cover ancient cave art, researchers can accurately date the crust and, by default, provide a minimum age for the application of the underlying pigment.

[Continues . . .]

The paper is open access:

"The age of hand stencils in Maltravieso cave (Extremadura, Spain) established by U-Th dating, and its implications for the early development of art" | Journal of Archaeological Science: Reports

Abstract:

U-Th dating of associated carbonate crusts has been applied to date parietal art in Maltravieso cave, Extremadura, Spain. Known for its large collection of red hand stencils (≥60), one example previously dated to >66.7 ka [thousands of years ago] was taken to suggest Neandertal authorship.

Here we present a more detailed U-series study of hand stencils within the cave, and place the results in the context of the chronology of these motifs worldwide. Twenty-two carbonate samples overlying pigment of hand stencils were dated from the cave's Sala de las Pinturas and the Galería de la Serpiente. Minimum ages for the art range from the Holocene to the Middle Palaeolithic. Alongside published dating results from other sites, this demonstrates that Neandertals as well as modern humans could create these motifs.

[Recusant]

Our burly relatives made it into morning shows and evening "serious news" broadcasts in the US. I expect other national news outlets also featured this item (yes for ABC and BBC and I expect also France24 and so on). Basically it's putting a time window around the period in which Neanderthals and anatomically modern humans were getting it on. Two different papers came out in close succession which point to mutually supporting conclusions.

Not really news to anybody who's been paying attention to this beat. On the other hand I can easily picture a gent in a red hat scoffing that "those pencil-necked scientists don't know shit" when they assert that Neanderthals featured among the ancestors of many people living today.

There's a wide variety of sources for this item and I imagine many who read this will have already come across it.  For the record...

"Neanderthal-human interbreeding lasted 7,000 years, new study reveals" | Phys.org

A new analysis of DNA from ancient modern humans (Homo sapiens) in Europe and Asia has determined, more precisely than ever, the time period during which Neanderthals interbred with modern humans, starting about 50,500 years ago and lasting about 7,000 years—until Neanderthals began to disappear.

That interbreeding left Eurasians with many genes inherited from our Neanderthal ancestors, which in total make up between 1% and 2% of our genomes today.

The genome-based estimate is consistent with archaeological evidence that modern humans and Neanderthals lived side-by-side in Eurasia for between 6,000 and 7,000 years.

The analysis, which involved present-day human genomes as well as 58 ancient genomes sequenced from DNA found in modern human bones from around Eurasia, found an average date for Neanderthal-Homo sapiens interbreeding of about 47,000 years ago. Previous estimates for the time of interbreeding ranged from 54,000 to 41,000 years ago.

The new dates also imply that the initial migration of modern humans from Africa into Eurasia was basically over by 43,500 years ago.

[. . .]

The timing of the interbreeding between Neanderthals and modern humans was corroborated by another, independent study conducted by MPI-EVA researchers and was published Dec. 12 in the journal Nature. That study, an analysis of two newly sequenced genomes of Homo sapiens that lived about 45,000 years ago, also found a date of 47,000 years ago.

"Although the ancient genomes were published in previous studies, they had not been analyzed to look at Neanderthal ancestry in this detailed way. We created a catalog of Neanderthal ancestry segments in modern humans. By jointly analyzing all these samples together, we inferred the period of gene flow was around 7,000 years," Manjusha Chintalapati [co-lead author] said.

"The Max Planck group actually sequenced new ancient DNA samples that allowed them to date the Neanderthal gene flow directly. And they came up with a similar timing as us."

[Continues . . .]

An article in Nature about the two papers:

"Neanderthals and humans interbred more recently than scientists thought" | Nature

News releases from the Max Planck Institute on the papers:

"New timeline for Neandertal gene flow event" | MPG

"Oldest modern human genomes sequenced" | MPG

The Science paper is behind a paywall.

Editor's summary:

Gene flow from archaic hominins into modern humans, and vice versa, has been amply demonstrated in recent years. However, many questions remain about how selection has acted on introgressed variants as well as the diversity of hominin individuals who contributed to this admixture.

Iasi et al. identified Neanderthal ancestry in genomic data from 59 ancient and 275 present-day human samples. They found that gene flow likely happened over a period of about 6000 years, and that positive and negative selection acted within about 100 generations on these introgressed segments. Surprisingly, the authors didn't find evidence for a second pulse of introgression into East Eurasians despite the increased levels of introgression found in modern individuals.

As is the one in Nature.

Abstract:

Modern humans arrived in Europe more than 45,000 years ago, overlapping at least 5,000 years with Neanderthals. Limited genomic data from these early modern humans have shown that at least two genetically distinct groups inhabited Europe, represented by Zlatý kůň, Czechia and Bacho Kiro, Bulgaria.

Here we deepen our understanding of early modern humans by analyzing one high-coverage genome and five low-coverage genomes from ~45,000 year-old remains from Ilsenhöhle in Ranis, Germany, and a further high-coverage genome from Zlatý kůň. We show that distant familial relationships link the Ranis and Zlatý kůň individuals and that they were part of the same small, isolated population that represents the deepest known split from the Out-of-Africa lineage.

Ranis genomes harbor Neanderthal segments that originate from a single admixture event shared with all non-Africans that we date to ~45,000-49,000 years ago. This implies that ancestors of all non-Africans sequenced to-date resided in a common population at this time, and further suggests that modern human remains older than 50,000 years from outside Africa represent different non-African populations.

This post is already too long, so more in subsequent posts. Busy days in the strong-brow department.   

[Recusant]

Not having read the papers, I am assuming the item below offers a different take on the findings. As I understand it we have extinction of both Neanderthals and anatomically modern humans (AMH) in Europe at about the same time, both being replaced by an incoming population of AMH who carried Neanderthal genes from an earlier association.

"Humans may not have survived without Neanderthals" | BBC

Far from triumphantly breezing out of Africa, modern humans went extinct many times before going on to populate the world, new studies have revealed.

The new DNA research has also shed new light on the role our Neanderthal cousins played in our success.

While these early European humans were long seen as a species which we successfully dominated after leaving Africa, new studies show that only humans who interbred with Neanderthals went on to thrive, while other bloodlines died out.

In fact, Neanderthal genes may have been crucial to our success by protecting us from new diseases we hadn't previously encountered.

The research for the first time pinpoints a short period 48,000 years ago when Homo sapiens interbred with Neanderthals after leaving Africa, after which they went on to expand into the wider world.

Homo sapiens had crossed over from the African continent before this, but the new research shows these populations before the interbreeding period did not survive.

Prof Johannes Krause of the Max Planck Institute of Evolutionary Biology, in Germany, told BBC News that the history of modern humans will now have to be rewritten.

"We see modern humans as a big story of success, coming out of Africa 60,000 years ago and expanding into all ecosystems to become the most successful mammal on the planet," he said. "But early on we were not, we went extinct multiple times."

[Continues . . .]

[Recusant]

Last item of the three today re our stocky ancestors (too many?) This one is less flashy and came out before the two papers which actually made it into the mainstream news:

"Neanderthals and modern humans must be classed as separate species to best track our origins, study claims" | Phys.org

A new study published by researchers at London's Natural History Museum and Institute of Philosophy, KU Leuven has reinforced the claim that Neanderthals and modern-day humans (Homo sapiens) must be classed as separate species in order to best track our evolutionary history.

Different researchers have different definitions as to what classifies as a species. It is undisputed that H. sapiens and Neanderthals originate from the same parental species, however studies into Neanderthal genetics and evolution have reignited the debate over whether they should be classed as separate from H. sapiens or rather a subspecies (H. sapiens neanderthalensis).

Advocating the former, Chris Stringer (Natural History Museum, London) and Andra Meneganzin (Institute of Philosophy, KU Leuven, Belgium) state that despite the inherent limitations of the fossil record, there is enough morphological, ecological, genetic and temporal evidence to justify this categorization, and claim that this evidence reflects the complexity of the speciation process, in which populations from one parent species progressively diverge to become different descendant species.

Taxonomic disagreement, they claim, is best explained by how the speciation process is modeled in the record, rather than conflicts between evidence types.

[Continues . . .]

The paper is open access:

"Homo sapiens, Neanderthals and Speciation Complexity in Palaeoanthropology" | Evolutionary Journal of the Linnean Society

Abstract:

Tracking the origins of new species and delimiting taxa across space and time present well-trodden sources of controversy for palaeoanthropology. Although biological diversity comes with frustratingly elusive boundaries, the task of describing and understanding diversity remains no less crucial, and palaeotaxonomy no more dispensable.

This is epitomized by recent developments in discussions on our species' origins and the extent to which Middle Pleistocene hominin forms represent distinct lineages. While it is tempting to think that progress in such debates is only hampered by the paucity of fossil and genomic data, we argue that problems also lie with unrealistic assumptions in theory.

In particular, we examine ongoing discussions on whether H. sapiens and Neanderthal deserve distinct species status as a means to advocate for the necessity of reframing speciation in palaeoanthropology in a more biologically plausible way. We argue that available palaeontological evidence is best interpreted under a framework that sees speciation as an evolutionary process that starts in space, thereby involving a geographic dimension, and progresses in time, thereby involving a diachronic dimension, with an incremental accumulation of relevant characters at different phases of the process.

We begin by discussing evidence about species-level differentiation of H. sapiens and Neanderthals and analyze major sources of taxonomic disagreement, before illustrating the potential of this perspective in making progress on the earliest stages of H. sapiens speciation within Africa.

[Recusant]

Those three posts may have been heavy going all at once. A palate cleanser . . .

Our sense of smell isn't outstanding but it does work. As I recall the Neanderthals appear to have had more capacious olfactory passages than anatomically modern humans. They generally had impressive beaks. Is it reasonable to suspect that they had a better sense of smell than AMH? The following question arises naturally for me...

Depending on how much bathing went on I imagine all hominins tended to have a bit of a pong to them. Likely more so in a cold climate, as prevailed in Europe at the time. Would either species/subspecies be able to smell the difference between them? How did that factor, if at all, in the level of intercourse (general and sexual) between the two?

Same would apply to the Denisovans I imagine.

Not questions to which we are ever likely to have reliable answers. Just thoughts about lives lived in the far distant past. 

[The Magic Pudding..]

Those three posts may have been heavy going all at once. A palate cleanser . . .

Our sense of smell isn't outstanding but it does work. As I recall the Neanderthals appear to have had more capacious olfactory passages than anatomically modern humans. They generally had impressive beaks. Is it reasonable to suspect that they had a better sense of smell than AMH? The following question arises naturally for me...

Depending on how much bathing went on I imagine all hominins tended to have a bit of a pong to them. Likely more so in a cold climate, as prevailed in Europe at the time. Would either species/subspecies be able to smell the difference between them? How did that factor, if at all, in the level of intercourse (general and sexual) between the two?

Same would apply to the Denisovans I imagine.

Not questions to which we are ever likely to have reliable answers. Just thoughts about lives lived in the far distant past. 

So  the obvious conclusion to be drawn from this is that the demise of the Neanderthals is due to the preference of female Neanderthal snozes for the bastard fucker scumbag newcomers, could be.

[Recusant]

So the obvious conclusion to be drawn from this is that the demise of the Neanderthals is due to the preference of female Neanderthal snozes for the bastard fucker scumbag newcomers, could be.

Could be, I suppose. Or, going by the BBC item above, there may have been a particularly nasty set of circumstances that in effect wiped out most of the humans (Neanderthal and anatomically modern) in the Neanderthal's range. Still, the people who re-populated that range had Neanderthals among their ancestors.

My thoughts were more along the lines of the nature of the encounters over thousands of years. Those would have been many and varied given the more or less significant contribution they made to our ancestry. Stretching toward trying to imagine what it was like for the parties involved. 

[Tank]

28,000-year-old Neanderthal-and-human 'Lapedo child' lived tens of thousands of years after our closest relatives went extinct

Researchers used a novel method of radiocarbon dating to figure out the age of the Lapedo child, who had both Neanderthal and human traits.

The skeleton of a child with both Neanderthal and modern-human features has been dated to around 28,000 years ago, according to new research that used a new chemical method to pull off the feat.

The new dates, which range from 25,830 to 26,600 B.C., change what archaeologists initially thought about the burial rituals surrounding the "Lapedo child" in what is now Portugal.

[Icarus]

Stumbled across this article from BBC...........the article closes by stating that Neanderthal genetic markers are still among us.   That is a startling revelation that explains the presence of MAGA people in the U.S.

https://www.bbc.com/reel/video/p0kytlx7/how-sex-with-neanderthals-changed-us-forever

[Recusant]

Stumbled across this article from BBC...........the article closes by stating that Neanderthal genetic markers are still among us.  That is a startling revelation that explains the presence of MAGA people in the U.S.

https://www.bbc.com/reel/video/p0kytlx7/how-sex-with-neanderthals-changed-us-forever

Apparently the hypothesis that Neanderthal did not advance beyond stone tools is falsified.

"Ancient bone spear tip found in Russia is oldest in Europe and made by Neanderthals" | Phys.org

An international team has unearthed the oldest spear tip ever found in Europe and notes that it was fashioned by Neanderthals. In their paper published in the Journal of Archaeological Science, the group describes how and where the spear tip was found, its condition and what they have learned about it through extensive study.

The spear tip was found back in 2003 in a sediment layer in a cave in the North Caucasus, Russia, along with a host of bones from a variety of animals, and also the remnants of a campfire. It was only recently that the spear tip was fully examined.

The research team used spectroscopy, computed tomography, and other microscopy techniques and were able to ascertain that the spear tip (which was 9 cm long) had been made from the bone of an animal, likely a bison. It had also been attached to a wooden shaft using a type of tar.

The team was also able to date the spear back to between 80,000 and 70,000 years ago. This predates the arrival of modern humans in Europe (approximately 45,000 years ago), leaving Neanderthals as the likely makers of the spear tip.

Further study of the spear tip showed that it had been shaped using stone tools, and that it had been used either in battle or for hunting—there were cracks showing it had struck something very hard. There were also no signs of long use, which the team suggests means it had likely been used successfully shortly after it was made.

The paper is behind a paywall.

Abstract:

This paper presents a detailed analysis of a unique pointy bone artefact produced by Neanderthals, which was found in 2003 in a Middle Paleolithic layer dated c. 80–70 ka at Mezmaiskaya Cave in the Caucasus. The definition and interpretation of anthropic traces related to technological modifications and functional use of the bone tool were analyzed using stereoscopic and metallographic microscopes, high-resolution digital microscopy, and microfocus computed tomography. Research of a bitumen residue preserved on the specimen was done using Fourier-transform infrared microscopy and spectroscopy, and crystal-optical microscopy.

Based on the totality of analytical and comparative data we interpret the artefact as the tip of a hunting weapon that was likely mounted on a shaft made from wood. Several lines of evidence suggest its short use as a bone-tipped hunting projectile.

The results suggest an independent invention of bone-tipped hunting weapons by Neanderthals in Europe long before the arrival of Upper Paleolithic modern humans to the continent, and also show that the production technology of bone-tipped hunting weapons used by Neanderthals was in the nascent level in comparison to those used and introduced to Eurasia by modern humans.

[Recusant]

A paper supporting the idea that Neanderthals were a separate species from anatomically modern humans--apparently there has been some harrumphing to reclassify them as a subspecies of Homo sapiens. Clearly our species and Neanderthals produced viable offspring, and interbred for as long as they were around. Still, I think it's reasonable to classify them as a separate species. Also it's reason enough to continue spamming this thread. 

"Neanderthals and modern humans must be classed as separate species to best track our origins, study claims" | Phys.org

A new study published by researchers at London's Natural History Museum and Institute of Philosophy, KU Leuven has reinforced the claim that Neanderthals and modern-day humans (Homo sapiens) must be classed as separate species in order to best track our evolutionary history.

Different researchers have different definitions as to what classifies as a species. It is undisputed that H. sapiens and Neanderthals originate from the same parental species, however studies into Neanderthal genetics and evolution have reignited the debate over whether they should be classed as separate from H. sapiens or rather a subspecies (H. sapiens neanderthalensis).

[. . .]

Mapping speciation over a 400,000-year period from paleontological and archaeological evidence has proven challenging for scientists, as in the later stages of speciation H. sapiens and Neanderthals continued to interbreed and exchange genes and behaviors. However, to reliably trace modern human evolution, categorizations need to be made about anatomical and geographical developments.

The study claims that if interbreeding was the final word in determining species status, then hundreds of distinct species of mammals and birds today would have their separate species status revoked and that without recognizing patterns in evolution and subsequent categorization, the question of when a species first appeared becomes more intractable.

[Continues . . .]

The paper is open access:

"Homo sapiens, Neanderthals and speciation complexity in palaeoanthropology" | Evolutionary Journal of the Linnean Society

Abstract:

Tracking the origins of new species and delimiting taxa across space and time present well-trodden sources of controversy for palaeoanthropology. Although biological diversity comes with frustratingly elusive boundaries, the task of describing and understanding diversity remains no less crucial, and palaeotaxonomy no more dispensable.

This is epitomized by recent developments in discussions on our species' origins and the extent to which Middle Pleistocene hominin forms represent distinct lineages. While it is tempting to think that progress in such debates is only hampered by the paucity of fossil and genomic data, we argue that problems also lie with unrealistic assumptions in theory.

In particular, we examine ongoing discussions on whether Homo sapiens and Neanderthals deserve distinct species status as a means to advocate for the necessity of reframing speciation in palaeoanthropology in a more biologically plausible way. We argue that available palaeontological evidence is best interpreted under a framework that sees speciation as an evolutionary process that starts in space, thereby involving a geographical dimension, and progresses in time, thereby involving a diachronic dimension, with an incremental accumulation of relevant characters at different phases of the process.

We begin by discussing evidence about species-level differentiation of H. sapiens and Neanderthals and analyse major sources of taxonomic disagreement, before illustrating the potential of this perspective in making progress on the earliest stages of H. sapiens speciation within Africa.

[Recusant]

Examination of a hypothesis that a geomagnetic excursion (reversal of Earth's magnetic polarity) was at least partially responsible for the disappearance of Neanderthals.

"Neanderthal extinction: a space physicist reopens the debate" | The Conversation

Neanderthals have long been the subject of intense scientific debate. This is largely because we still lack clear answers to some of the big questions about their existence and supposed disappearance.

One of the latest developments is a recent study from the University of Michigan, published in the journal Science Advances [press release--paper linked below]. It proposes that Neanderthals went extinct for astrophysical reasons.

The work was led by Agnit Mukhopadhyay, an expert in space physics, a discipline that studies natural plasmas, especially those found within our own solar system. Plasma is the state of matter that dominates the universe: the Sun and stars are huge balls of plasma, as are the northern lights.

Mukhopadhyay's research suggests that a shift in the Earth's magnetic poles around 41,000 years ago, known as the Laschamp event, may have contributed to the extinction of Neanderthals.

According to his work, the extreme weakening of the Earth's magnetic field during that event allowed for greater penetration of cosmic and ultraviolet radiation. This would have generated more aggressive environmental conditions that Neanderthals could not withstand, giving our own species, Homo sapiens, an edge.

In this context, sapiens would have had an advantage over Neanderthals thanks to their presumed use of close-fitting clothing, ochre – a mineral with protective properties against the sun – and taking shelter in caves. Caves which, by the way, on numerous occasions were inhabited by both Neanderthals and our own species.

The hypothesis is interesting, and is based on innovative three-dimensional models of the Earth's geospatial system during this period. However, as with many hypotheses that attempt to explain complex phenomena on the basis of a single variable, its scope and some of the assumptions on which it is based need to be examined more closely.

[Closer critical examination . . .]

Put simply, the archaeological record does not support Mukhopadhyay's hypothesis. There is no evidence of an abrupt demographic collapse coinciding with this geomagnetic event, nor of a widespread catastrophic impact on other human or animal species.

Moreover, if solar radiation had been such a determining factor, one would expect high mortality also among populations of sapiens that did not wear tight clothing or live in caves (in warm regions of Africa, for instance). As far as we know, this did not happen.

When trying to explain the disappearance of Neanderthals, it is vital that we integrate multiple lines of archaeological, paleoanthropological and genetic evidence.

[Continues . . .]

The Mukhopadhyay et al. paper (which covers more than the hypothesized effect on Neanderthals) is open access:

"Wandering of the auroral oval 41,000 years ago" | Science Advances

Abstract:

In the recent geological past, Earth's magnetic field reduced to ~10% of the modern values and the magnetic poles shifted away from the geographic poles, causing the Laschamps geomagnetic excursion, about 41 millennia ago. The excursion lasted ~2000 years, with dipole strength reduction and tilting spanning 300 years.

During this period, the geomagnetic field's multipolarity resembled outer planets, causing rapid magnetospheric changes. To our knowledge, this study presents the first space plasma analysis of the excursion, linking the geomagnetic field, magnetospheric system, and upper atmosphere in sequence using feedback channels for distinct temporal epochs.

A three-dimensional reconstruction of Earth's geospace system shows that these shifts affected auroral regions and open magnetic field lines, causing them to expand and wander toward lower latitudes. These changes likely altered the upper atmosphere's composition and influenced anthropological progress during that era. Looking through a modern lens, such an event would disrupt contemporary technology, including communications and satellite infrastructure.