Ancient humans may have hibernated to survive brutal glacial winters

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Living in darkness, or even hibernating, could have left ancient humans with bone lesions

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Some of the ancient humans living in Europe half a million years ago had a remarkable strategy for dealing with winter: they hibernated. At least, that is the claim being made by two researchers. Others dispute the evidence – but ongoing research suggests that it might be possible to induce a hibernation-like state in modern humans.

Sima de los Huesos – the “pit of bones” – lies in northern Spain and is one of the world’s most important sites for studying human evolution. Excavations at …

source: newscientist.com