Australopithecus afarensis© "Australopithecus afarensis" by Rod Waddington is licensed under BY-SA 2.0. Natural history is a difficult thing to conceptualize. You’ve got eons of undocumented progress, ...

Rothman is managing editor at TIME. A visitor looks at the 3.2 million year old fossilized remains of "Lucy", the most complete example of the hominid Australopithecus afarensis, at the Houston Museum ...

Perhaps the world's most famous early human ancestor, the 3.2-million-year-old ape "Lucy" was the first Australopithecus afarensis skeleton ever found, though her remains are only about 40 percent ...

Ancient, fossilized teeth, uncovered during a decades-long archaeology project in northeastern Ethiopia, indicate that two different kinds of hominins, or human ancestors, lived in the same place ...

Sign up for CNN’s Wonder Theory science newsletter. Explore the universe with news on fascinating discoveries, scientific advancements and more. Fossils of early ...

Scans of eight fossilized adult and infant Australopithecus afarensis skulls reveal a prolonged period of brain growth during development that may have set the stage for extended childhood learning in ...

Australopithecus afarensis was an upright walking species, but the question of whether it also spent much of its time in trees has been the subject of much debate. For the first time, scientists have ...

The 3.3-million-year-old fossils of an Australopithecus afarensis child from Dikika, Ethiopia, suggest the hominid climbed trees. The individual’s right shoulder blade (side view) is visible beneath ...

A new study led by paleoanthropologists reveals that Lucy's species Australopithecus afarensis had an ape-like brain. However, the protracted brain growth suggests that -- as is the case in humans -- ...

A newfound humanlike species may be another contender for the ancestor of the human lineage, researchers say. This ancient relative of humanity coexisted alongside the famous Lucy about 3.4 million ...