Rethinking how we name and classify our human ancestors following recent evolutionary discoveries

Monash University

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New Monash University research argues our Paranthropus (pictured) and Australopithecus ancestors who lived up to 5 million years ago should be included under the Homo group of species.

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Credit: Ian Towle, Monash University.

Recent advances in our understanding of human evolution challenge the way we currently name and classify our ancestors, according to new research from Monash University.

The research, published in the American Journal of Biological Anthropology, argues that we need a rethink, and proposes reclassifying all species of humans and our closely related fossil relatives that have lived in the past 4-5 million years as part of the Homo genus.

Human evolution is often presented as a straightforward progression through distinct species, from ape-like ancestors, through Australopithecus and earlier members of Homo, culminating in Homo Sapiens that live today.

But the fossil record tells a much more complex story, with new discoveries repeatedly blurring the characteristics once thought to define us and our close relatives.

Lead researcher Dr Ian Towle, a Research Fellow at the Monash Biomedicine Discovery Institute, said recent discoveries are eroding the usefulness and accuracy of current classification, including the current species in our own genus Homo, but also in Australopithecus and Paranthropus, who all lived within the past 5 million years.

“Recent fossil discoveries and advances in evolutionary and genetic analysis make this an ideal time to reconsider whether our traditional taxonomy still accurately reflects human evolution,” Dr Towle said.

“These groups do not necessarily represent distinct evolutionary branches, or ‘clades’, and differences in behaviour and ecology once used to distinguish them have also become increasingly difficult to maintain.

“I propose expanding Homo to include these other groups to provide a more accurate and stable way to represent the complex evolutionary relationships revealed by the growing fossil record.”

In the past 50 years, a growing understanding of evolution has transformed how scientists classify the natural world. 

Modern taxonomy, the science of naming and classifying organisms, increasingly aims to reflect genuine evolutionary relationships, grouping species according to their shared ancestry. 

But when it comes to our own evolutionary history, scientists have been slower to make the transition.

Recent decades have seen a trend to represent a genuine evolutionary group, or clade, of a common ancestor and all of its descendants.

The Homo group have historically been defined by having large brains, sophisticated tool use and particular aspects of anatomy and behaviour. 

But there are now very small-brained members of our genus, and complex behaviours were likely in Paranthropus and Australopithecus.

Dr Towle argues reclassifying Australopithecus and Paranthropus species under the category of Homo will provide a more coherent understanding of our evolutionary history and avoid continual redefinition as we discover new fossils and learn more about our ancestors.

“The more we learn about our ancestors and close fossil relatives, the more we realise how complex and non-linear our family tree is,” Dr Towle said.

“Expanding the Homo genus to also include species of Australopithecus and Paranthropus will allow us to account for differences without regularly reclassifying particular groups.”

Read the research paper: https://doi.org/10.1002/ajpa.70344

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Images available here.

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Journal

American Journal of Biological Anthropology

DOI

10.1002/ajpa.70344 

Method of Research

Meta-analysis

Subject of Research

People

Article Title

Clades, grades, and the genus problem: A case for revising hominin taxonomy

Article Publication Date

19-Aug-2026

 

Detecting ammonia leaks at concentrations as low as 1 ppm!

KIMS, Pusan National University, Incheon National University, and Macquarie University develop an ultrasensitive ammonia gas sensor based on eco-friendly perovskite materials

National Research Council of Science & Technology

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Eco-friendly perovskite material that transforms into a flower-like shape when exposed to ammonia

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Credit: Korea Institute of Materials Science (KIMS)

# Lead-free antimony-based perovskite enables highly sensitive ammonia detection down to 1 ppm

# Newly identified sensing mechanism reveals reversible ammonia intercalation and enhanced electrical conductivity, offering potential for safety monitoring in hydrogen and ammonia energy infrastructure

 CHANGWON, South Korea — A research team led by Principal Researcher Myungkwan Song of the Energy & Environment Materials Research Division at the Korea Institute of Materials Science (KIMS), headed by President Chul-jin Choi, has developed an ultrasensitive ammonia gas sensor using an environmentally friendly, lead-free perovskite material. The research was conducted in collaboration with teams led by Professor Hyung Woo Lee of Pusan National University, Professor Youngho Kang of Incheon National University, and Professor Jincheol Kim of Macquarie University in Australia. In addition to developing the high-performance sensor, the researchers elucidated, for the first time, the mechanism by which it detects ammonia, providing a new direction for the development of next-generation perovskite-based gas sensors. The technology is expected to serve as a key gas-detection solution for improving safety in an emerging hydrogen economy that uses ammonia as an energy carrier. 

 Ammonia has recently attracted significant attention as a next-generation hydrogen carrier because it can facilitate the storage and transportation of hydrogen, which is otherwise difficult to handle. As a result, ammonia is emerging as an important material in the growing hydrogen economy. However, even small ammonia leaks can be harmful to human health. High-performance sensors capable of immediately detecting trace leaks are therefore essential at storage and transportation facilities, power plants, and industrial sites. In particular, exposure to ammonia at concentrations of only several tens of parts per million can affect worker health, creating a need for more sensitive and accurate detection technologies.

 Conventional perovskite-based gas sensors can detect ammonia with high sensitivity, but most contain lead (Pb), which is harmful to human health and the environment and limits their potential for commercialization. To address this issue, the research team developed a lead-free perovskite based on antimony (Sb), known as formamidinium antimony bromide (FA₃Sb₂Br₉), and applied it as the active sensing material in an ammonia gas sensor. The resulting device achieved both environmental advantages and excellent sensing performance.

 The sensor reliably detected ammonia at concentrations as low as 1 ppm. Its signal increased consistently as the ammonia concentration rose, demonstrating its ability to quantitatively determine ammonia concentrations. When exposed to ammonia at a concentration of 100 ppm, the sensor responded in just 13 seconds, while its electrical signal increased by as much as 235%, demonstrating outstanding sensing performance. The sensor also showed substantially lower responses to other gases, including methane (CH₄), carbon monoxide (CO), nitrogen oxides (NOₓ), hydrogen (H₂), and methanol (MeOH), confirming its high selectivity for ammonia. After being stored for two months, the sensor retained approximately 97% of its initial performance, demonstrating excellent long-term stability. It can also be fabricated through a simple spin-coating process using solution-based materials, making it well suited for large-area production and lower-cost manufacturing.

 One of the study’s most significant achievements was the identification of a new ammonia-sensing mechanism, in addition to the development of the high-performance sensor. Conventional explanations have generally attributed the electrical signals of ammonia sensors to ammonia molecules adsorbing onto the surface of the sensing material. The research team found, however, that ammonia molecules reversibly intercalate into the perovskite material and induce p-type doping. This process increases the material’s electrical conductivity and generates the sensor signal. The mechanism differs fundamentally from conventional surface adsorption-based sensing and provides a new materials-design principle for improving the sensitivity and selectivity of future perovskite gas sensors. 

 The technology could be used as a safety-monitoring sensor for the early detection of trace gas leaks at power plants and ships that use ammonia as a fuel or hydrogen carrier. It could also be deployed at ammonia production, storage, and transportation facilities, as well as fertilizer and chemical plants. Because the sensor can be produced through a relatively simple solution process, the technology is suitable for large-area fabrication and mass production. It could ultimately be developed into various formats, including portable detectors, sensors attached directly to pipelines, and real-time hazardous-gas monitoring systems. The technology is expected to contribute to the domestic production of high-performance gas sensors that are currently heavily dependent on imports, while reducing maintenance and operational costs. It could also strengthen the competitiveness of Korea’s materials and sensor industries in the rapidly growing hydrogen and ammonia energy markets. 

 “This study is significant not only because we developed a highly sensitive ammonia sensor using an environmentally friendlier, lead-free perovskite, but also because we identified its sensing mechanism at the atomic level,” said Myungkwan Song, principal researcher and project leader at KIMS. “We expect this technology to be widely applied to safety management for hydrogen- and ammonia-based energy infrastructure, as well as hazardous-gas monitoring at industrial sites,” he added.

 The research was supported by the Ministry of Science and ICT through the KIMS Institutional Research Program, the Global Leading Research Center Program of the National Research Foundation of Korea, and the Global TOP Strategic Research Group Program of the National Research Council of Science & Technology. The findings were published online on July 27, 2026, in Small Structures (Impact Factor: 8.9), a leading international journal in materials science.

 

Operating principle and sensing response characteristics of the lead-free perovskite-based ammonia sensor

Credit

Korea Institute of Materials Science (KIMS)

About Korea Institute of Materials Science(KIMS)

KIMS is a non-profit government-funded research institute under the Ministry of Science and ICT of the Republic of Korea. As the only institute specializing in comprehensive materials technologies in Korea, KIMS has contributed to Korean industry by carrying out a wide range of activities related to materials science including R&D, inspection, testing&evaluation, and technology support.

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Journal

Small Structures

DOI

10.1002/sstr.70516 

Article Title

Antimony-Based Lead-Free Perovskite Thin Films for Highly Sensitive Ammonia (NH3) Gas Detection

 

Higher fluoride levels in public drinking water during pregnancy may be linked to differences in children's cognition scores, NIH-funded study finds

Associations appeared when fluoride levels in neighborhood drinking water were close to or above current U.S. recommended levels

Columbia University's Mailman School of Public Health

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August 17, 2026-- Pregnant mothers who lived in neighborhoods where public drinking water fluoride levels were near or above the current U.S. recommended levels, tended to have children who scored lower on tests of fluid reasoning as fluoride levels increased, according to a new study supported by the National Institutes of Health’s Environmental influences on Child Health Outcomes (ECHO) Program. The findings are published in the American Journal of Epidemiology.

Fluoride occurs naturally in some water sources and is commonly added to public water systems to help prevent cavities. The paper’s authors note that a recent National Toxicology Program review examined evidence linking fluoride exposure levels above 1,500 micrograms per liter in drinking water with lower IQ scores in children. However, most U.S. public water systems have lower fluoride levels, and questions remain about associations at lower levels typically found in the United States.

ECHO researchers looked at whether fluoride levels in public drinking water during pregnancy were related to cognitive scores assessed during childhood.

"This study addresses an important gap by evaluating prenatal water fluoride and child cognition in a large U.S. sample," said lead author Katrina Simon, PhD, in the Department of Environmental Health Sciences of Columbia University Mailman School of Public Health. "Findings from this work offer evidence that can inform ongoing guidance aimed at supporting children's development."

Researchers reported that children whose mothers had higher estimated fluoride levels in public drinking water during pregnancy tended to score lower on tests of fluid cognition that include problem-solving, memory, attention, and the ability to adapt to new information. Higher water fluoride levels were only linked to lower fluid cognition scores when water fluoride levels were near and above 675 micrograms per liter, which is close to the current U.S. Public Health Service recommended level of 700 micrograms, or 0.7 milligrams, per liter for fluoridated water. The current regulatory level set by EPA is higher at 4,000 micrograms per liter. Above 675 micrograms per liter, each 500 micrograms per liter increase in fluoride was associated with an average 3.36-point lower score on the standardized fluid cognition scale.

Researchers also found that the relationship between prenatal fluoride levels and cognition was specific to fluid cognition. Importantly, the study did not identify a link between fluoride and crystallized cognition, which includes learned knowledge such as vocabulary, across all ages.

In addition, the associations appeared stronger when cognition was assessed at a younger age. Children younger than 7 years of age showed larger differences in cognition scores associated with higher prenatal fluoride exposure compared to older children. Additional research is needed to better understand these age-related findings. 

The study included 2,514 children born between 2006 and 2019 who completed cognitive testing between ages 3 and 17.

To estimate prenatal water fluoride exposure, researchers linked publicly available drinking water fluoride measurements to residential address information collected during pregnancy from ECHO participants. The study focused specifically on fluoride levels in public drinking water systems and did not measure total fluoride exposure from all possible sources, such as toothpaste, tea, foods, supplements, bottled water, or private wells.

Researchers then compared these estimates with children's performance on NIH Toolbox cognition assessments, while accounting for factors such as parental education, parental age, prenatal tobacco exposure, child sex, season of conception, and neighborhood characteristics.

“Because our study used fluoride measurements from public water systems that are collected as part of routine drinking water monitoring, the findings may help inform future evaluations of public drinking water guidelines,” said co-senior author Anne Nigra, PhD, also of Columbia University Mailman School of Public Health.

Community water fluoridation has long been used as a public health measure intended to reduce tooth decay. The current study does not evaluate the overall benefits and risks of community water fluoridation

“This study adds to a large body of work that looks at how early exposure to environmental contaminants may be associated with the development of the thinking and learning processes that are important for children’s developmental outcomes,” said co-senior author Amy Margolis, PhD, of The Ohio State University Wexner Medical Center and College of Medicine. “Continuing to study fluoride and other exposures will be integral in best supporting children’s environmental health and well-being.”

The researchers emphasize that this was an observational study. The findings demonstrate an association between prenatal fluoride exposure and children's cognition, but they do not prove that fluoride caused differences in cognitive performance. 

The authors noted that future research could focus on when children may be most sensitive to fluoride exposure and examine both potential developmental risks and dental health benefits to better understand relationships between fluoride exposure and child health. 

A full list of co-authors and their institutions can be found in the paper.

 

About ECHO 
The ECHO Cohort Consortium is a research program supported by the National Institutes of Health (NIH) with the mission to enhance the health of children for generations to come. ECHO Cohort investigators study the effects of a broad range of early environmental influences on child health and development. For more information, visit echochildren.org. Read the Research Summary on the ECHO website.

 

Columbia University Mailman School of Public Health

Founded in 1922, the Columbia University Mailman School of Public Health pursues an agenda of research, education, and service to address the critical and complex public health issues affecting New Yorkers, the nation and the world. The Columbia Mailman School is the third largest recipient of NIH grants among schools of public health. Its nearly 300 multi-disciplinary faculty members work in more than 100 countries around the world, addressing such issues as preventing infectious and chronic diseases, environmental health, maternal and child health, health policy, climate change and health, and public health preparedness. It is a leader in public health education with more than 1,300 graduate students from 55 nations pursuing a variety of master’s and doctoral degree programs. The Columbia Mailman School is also home to numerous world-renowned research centers, including ICAP and the Center for Infection and Immunity. For more information, please visit www.mailman.columbia.edu.

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Journal

American Journal of Epidemiology

DOI

10.1093/aje/kwag186 

Article Title

Journal Article Accepted manuscript Prenatal exposure to fluoride in public water and child cognition in the US ECHO cohort, 2006-2019

Article Publication Date

14-Aug-2026

 

Caregivers are active agents in their infants’ learning and socialization, but how they do this differs across cultures

Study advances scientific framework for uncovering how infant development is shaped by culture

Northwestern University

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• Developmental scientists deepened a longstanding scientific and cultural partnership with a Wichi community in Argentina’s Chaco rain forest
• Examining mother-infant interactions reveals powerful commonalities in how moms and babies engage
• But also reveal distinct differences, shifting experts’ view of how early development unfolds

EVANSTON, Ill. — A baby sits on the floor and reaches toward a red ball on a floor and grunts. The mother responds, “Do you see the ball?” She picks it up and holds it in front of baby and says, “Do you want to hold the ball?”  The baby shrieks in excitement as the mother hands the ball to the baby.

Parent-infant interactions, often characterized by direct eye contact and ‘proto’ conversations, have long been thought to be the key to infants sense of their own ‘agency’: how infants begin to understand the intentions of people around them, and to influence them. We all recognize episodes of infants’ emerging sense of agency when we see it. Or do we?

Probably not. Most of the existing evidence is drawn exclusively from middle class, college-educated mothers and infants of European descent. There is scant evidence of how infant development unfolds in other cultural contexts and environments.

Extraordinary new research published in the July/August issue of the journal Infancy reveals how mothers from two distinct communities foster infants’ sense of agency. “Pathways to Agency: Cross-Cultural Evidence from Indigenous Wichi and Eurodescendant Caregiver-Infant Interactions” was coauthored by developmental scientists Sandra Waxman at Northwestern University, and Migdalia Padilla Colón and Andrea Taverna at Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Cientíticas y Técnicas (CONICET), Argentina.

Working within two distinct Argentine communities — the Indigenous Wichi in the remote Formosa province and Spanish-speaking European descendants in the urban setting of Rosario — the research team videorecorded caregiver-infant interactions beginning when infants were 12 months old and continuing until they were 2.5 years old. Twice daily, they documented naturally occurring interactions including free play, meals or snacks, physical movement and activity and engagement with others present.

The sites of these recordings were selected by families in each community, reflecting where each community's daily life naturally unfolds. Wichi families chose to host recordings in outdoor settings near their homes, while city dwelling European descendant families chose to host recordings inside their own homes. Then, together with native speakers of each community, the research team identified all episodes of social interaction between caregivers and infants.

What became evident, from reviewing these interactions, were strong commonalities in the mothers’ role supporting their infants’ developing agency. There were also striking differences. 

For example, in the European descendant urban families, interactions typically featured two-way attention between mother and infant, most often involving a toy. The exchanges were primarily coordinated with spoken language. In contrast, Wichi family interactions with infants were communal, including siblings and other members of the community. Wichi interactions were mostly non-verbal, expressed by hugs and gazes, and sometimes incorporated objects from the natural environment.

The study provides empirical evidence for alternative pathways to infants’ acquisition of agency.

“Our study shows nature and nurture going hand in hand. We observed infants’ exquisite sensitivity to interactions with their caregivers, and their flexibility in interpreting the patterns of interaction in the communities in which they are raised,” said Waxman, Louis W. Menk Professor of Psychology and principal investigator of the Infant and Child Development Center at Northwestern.

“If we’re going to understand how development unfolds, we need to look at how development is shaped in environments other than our own,” Waxman said.

The study would not be possible without the sustained relationship, now lasting over 20 years, between the Wichi community and Taverna’s research team in Argentina.

“What we see in the Wichi community is that agency is not simply something that develops within the individual child; it is co-constructed through relationships, shared activities and culturally organized ways of participating in the world,” Colón said. “Taking these different ontologies seriously allows us to recognize that there is not a single developmental pathway to agency.”

“Developmental psychology has spent decades studying how the relationship with the other constitutes the child as a subject and enables them to become an active agent in their own development,” Taverna said. “What this study shows is that this ‘otherness’ — and the culturally situated ways we relate to it — is not universal: It is deeply embedded in culture. Understanding this is not a minor nuance, it means rethinking one of the foundational questions of our discipline.”

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Journal

Infancy

DOI

10.1111/infa.70104 

Method of Research

Observational study

Subject of Research

People

Article Title

Caregivers are active agents in their infants’ learning and socialization, but how they do this differs across cultures

 

The hidden health cost of dollar store groceries

Study links lower food quality to higher rates of disease

University of California - Riverside

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While consumers may save a few bucks on groceries at dollar stores, they end up paying a higher price with their health. New UC Riverside research shows a link between dollar store food quality and higher rates of obesity, high blood pressure, cholesterol, and type 2 diabetes. 

Conversely, the study published in BMC Public Health links traditional grocery store access to better health metrics. These results held across the U.S., even accounting for factors including income and unemployment levels. 

However, at present, the census designates dollar stores as general merchandise outlets, rather than grocery stores, so they are often not included in studies relating to food consumption.

“I want to raise awareness that higher grocery costs are pushing people to buy highly processed, lower quality food at dollar stores, and it is negatively impacting their health in a similar way to fast food,” said Ryan Bruellman, UCR genetics, genomics & bioinformatics doctoral student and study first author.

Bruellman started this study with a general curiosity about unconventional grocery outlets. To understand their impact on customers’ health, he looked at data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s 500 Cities Project. The project covers the largest continental American metro areas and cities, including the greater Los Angeles and Inland Empire areas.

The dollar stores in the study included Dollar General, Dollar Tree, the 99 Cent store, and Family Dollar. Together, they represent a total of 34,000 locations. 

“Across the U.S. there are more dollar stores than traditional grocery stores,” Bruellman said. 

Bruellman used software called ArcGIS, which lets people map data and analyze how things are distributed across geographic areas. A GIS combines ordinary data like numbers, categories, and measurements with geographic locations so you can see patterns on a map.
In this case, Bruellman used it to map how many of these stores were within a 10-minute drive of residential areas. He combined this with a social vulnerability index in his calculations. The higher this metric is, the more issues people have affording groceries. 

Across all regions, the dollar stores had a significant effect on consumer health, but the effects were not uniform. In the South and the Midwest, the ratio of dollar stores to traditional grocery stores was roughly 50/50. “I think the sheer number of dollar stores in these regions is higher so their influence is greater,” Bruellman said. 

Additionally, Bruellman said the results varied across different cities. In some places, like Philadelphia, he said the data was not able to capture the influence of bodegas or smaller independent grocery stores. However, their presence likely lessened the impacts of dollar store grocery shopping.

It is the quality of the food, not its price, that is the cause of the health problems associated with their purchase. Bruellman says the solution is not having fewer dollar stores. Rather, policymakers could look at a variety of options to improve quality. 

These stores could form partnerships with local farmers to increase the amount of fresh fruits and vegetables on offer. “Ideally you’d have the healthier options available inside the dollar store,” Bruellman said. 

For stores uninterested in such partnerships, it might be possible for cities to encourage more local farmers markets and food banks.

“Traditionally, famers markets are often in areas that are farther from dollar stores. Placing them closer to the stores, meeting people where they are could improve access,” he said.

Ultimately, Bruellman hopes this study will encourage lawmakers to consider expanding people’s access to healthier food options. 

“The overarching thing is we shouldn’t think of traditional grocery stores as the only places to get food. People need to look beyond that,” Bruellman said. 

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Journal

BMC Public Health

DOI

10.1186/s12889-026-28145-y 

Article Title

Beyond proximity: how food quality in dollar and grocery stores influences health