Andes volcanoes – the missing link between algae blooms, whales and climate millions of years ago

Researchers work in the field at Cerro Ballena near Caldera, Chile, as part of a study showing that an increase in volcanic activity in the Andes in the Late Miocene Epoch likely resulted in a cooling of the Earth between 5.4 million and 7 million years ago. From left are team members Carolina Gutstein, Mark Clementz, Barbara Carrapa, Whitney Worrell, Priscilla Martinez and Fabían Muñoz.
Photo Credit: Carolina Gutstein

Scientific Frontline: Extended "At a Glance" Summary: Andes Volcanoes and the Late Miocene Marine-Climate Link

The Core Concept: During the Late Miocene epoch, massive volcanic eruptions in the Andes deposited nutrient-rich ash into the Southern Ocean, triggering widespread marine algae blooms that simultaneously fueled the evolution of gigantic whales, caused localized mass mortality events, and significantly cooled the Earth by drawing atmospheric carbon dioxide into the sea.

Key Distinction/Mechanism: While volcanic activity is traditionally understood as a driver of global warming through the emission of carbon dioxide, this mechanism demonstrates the opposite effect. The volcanic ash delivered vital nutrients (iron, phosphorus, and silicon) to the ocean, hyper-fertilizing primary producers like diatoms. This biological explosion sequestered vast amounts of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, creating a cooling feedback loop, while simultaneously producing neurotoxins in certain localized blooms that proved fatal to marine mammals.

Major Frameworks/Components: 

• Ocean Geochemistry & Fertilization: The role of volcanic ash in altering ocean chemistry by distributing trace elements like iron, which act as a critical limiting nutrient for marine primary producers.
• The Biological Pump: The process by which photosynthetic phytoplankton (such as diatoms) absorb atmospheric carbon dioxide and sequester it in the deep ocean, driving global temperature reductions.
• Paleoclimatic Modeling: The integration of fossil evidence, geologic geochronology, and computer simulations to test how oceanic biology responds to deliberate volcanic nutrient input.
• Evolutionary Gigantism: The correlation between highly productive, nutrient-rich marine environments and the evolutionary trend toward immense body sizes in baleen whales.

Planets need more water to support life than scientists previously thought

This image of Venus taken by NASA’s Mariner 10 spacecraft (left) is paired with an artist’s depiction of three possible atmospheres on a recently discovered exoplanet, Gliese 12b. This new University of Washington study explores how much surface water a planet needs to support life.
Image Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/R. Hurt (Caltech-IPAC

Scientific Frontline: Extended "At a Glance" Summary: Planetary Habitability and Minimum Water Thresholds

The Core Concept: Earth-sized exoplanets must possess at least 20% to 50% of the water volume found in Earth's oceans to maintain the critical natural climate cycles required to sustain surface water and support life. Planets with limited surface water—often classified as desert worlds—are highly unlikely to remain habitable, regardless of their position within a star's habitable zone.

Key Distinction/Mechanism: Planetary habitability hinges on the geologic carbon cycle, a water-driven process that regulates surface temperatures. If planetary water levels drop too low to sustain consistent rainfall, the chemical weathering of rocks ceases, halting the removal of carbon from the atmosphere. Consequently, carbon dioxide emitted by volcanic activity accumulates rapidly, trapping heat, evaporating the remaining surface water, and initiating a runaway greenhouse effect that sterilizes the planet.

Major Frameworks/Components:

• The Geologic Carbon Cycle: The continuous exchange of carbon between a planet's atmosphere and interior over millions of years, driven by precipitation, rock erosion, plate tectonics, and volcanic emissions.
• Refined Habitable Zone Metrics: An update to the traditional "Goldilocks zone" framework, emphasizing that an optimal orbital distance from a central star is insufficient for habitability without a minimum surface water inventory.
• Mechanistic Climate Modeling: The adaptation of Earth-based thermodynamic and carbon cycle models to arid exoplanets, utilizing complex simulations that refine variables such as wind-driven evaporation and low-volume precipitation estimates.
• The Venus Analog: The theoretical framework proposing that Venus lost its habitability and surface water due to forming with slightly less water than Earth, which imbalanced its carbon cycle and triggered runaway warming.

Diamonds are not a geoengineer’s best friend

Absorption not Reflection.
Image Credit: Scientific Frontline

Scientific Frontline: Extended "At a Glance" Summary: Stratospheric Aerosol Injection with Diamond Dust

The Core Concept: Stratospheric aerosol injection (SAI) is a solar geoengineering strategy intended to cool the Earth by dispersing highly reflective aerosols into the stratosphere, mimicking the natural cooling effects of volcanic eruptions. Recent studies evaluated synthetic diamond dust as a potentially safer alternative to environmentally damaging sulfate aerosols.

Key Distinction/Mechanism: While previous large-scale climate models theorized that diamond dust would be an optimal reflective particle, new first-principles calculations demonstrate a critical flaw. The most economical method for mass-producing nanodiamonds (detonation synthesis) inevitably introduces \(sp^2\)-hybridized carbon impurities. These impurities form a hard, dark carbon shell around the diamond core that absorbs heat rather than reflecting sunlight, decreasing the material's light-scattering efficacy by up to 25%.

Origin/History: The definitive research disproving the efficacy of diamond dust in SAI was published in the Journal of Aerosol Science (Volume 194, 2026) by researchers at Washington University in St. Louis, utilizing sophisticated simulations funded by a 2024 grant from the Simons Foundation International.

Ancient Zircon Crystals Provide a Window into Early Earth History

A zircon crystal exhibiting distinct edges, or rims, from a metamorphic event after its initial formation.
Photo Credit: Shane K. Houchin

Scientific Frontline: "At a Glance" Summary: Ancient Zircons and Early Earth History

• Main Discovery: Analysis of ancient zircon grains indicates that early Earth experienced rapid oxidation shortly after its formation and confirms that plate tectonics were active much earlier than previously recognized.
• Methodology: Researchers utilized U XANES oxybarometry at synchrotron facilities to precisely measure trace elements, specifically the oxidation states of uranium, encapsulated within the cores and distinct rims of ancient zircon crystals.
• Key Data: Zircon rims dating to 4.1 billion years ago demonstrated unexpectedly high oxidation levels, indicating crustal oxidation merely 350 million years after Earth's formation, while distinct high-pressure and low-temperature signatures point to subduction zone activity at least 3.35 billion years ago.
• Significance: The results challenge the long-held paradigm that the Hadean eon was a completely dry and highly reduced environment, instead suggesting the early presence of abundant water and the early onset of dynamic geological processes necessary for the evolution of life.
• Future Application: The novel U XANES oxybarometry technique will be applied to analyze hundreds of additional zircon grains spanning various geological periods to construct a more comprehensive record of planetary evolution and shifting environmental conditions.
• Branch of Science: Geochemistry, Geosciences, and Planetary Science.
• Additional Detail: The analyzed zircon crystals, sourced primarily from the Jack Hills region of Western Australia, measure only a quarter of a millimeter in length but feature growth layers analogous to tree rings that preserve exact historical magma chemistry conditions.

What Is: Supervolcanoes

Yellowstone Supervolcano undergoing a catastrophic super-eruption.
Image Credit: Scientific Frontline / stock image

Scientific Frontline: "At a Glance" Summary

• Main Discovery: Supervolcanoes are distinct thermodynamic entities defined by the explosive ejection of over 1,000 cubic kilometers of bulk deposits (VEI 8) and the subsequent formation of massive calderas through crustal collapse rather than edifice construction.
• Methodology: Identification relies on high-altitude satellite imagery to spot elliptical boundaries and the anisotropy of magnetic susceptibility (AMS) to reconstruct ancient flow directions, while modern monitoring utilizes GPS geodesy and seismic arrays to detect ground inflation and magmatic fluid movement.
• Key Data: The Youngest Toba Tuff eruption (74,000 years ago) ejected an estimated 2,800 to 5,300 cubic kilometers of magma, potentially triggering a genetic bottleneck in humans; comparatively, the global recurrence rate for VEI 8 events is estimated at once every 50,000 to 100,000 years.
• Significance: These events fundamentally partition geological time and alter planetary atmospheric chemistry for decades, with historical eruptions like Toba hypothesized to have induced "volcanic winters" that lowered global temperatures by 3 to 5 degrees Celsius.
• Future Application: Current research focuses on distinguishing between tectonic faults and harmonic tremors indicating fluid movement, as well as monitoring gas geochemistry ratios (carbon dioxide to water vapor) at high-risk sites like Campi Flegrei to forecast the potential rejuvenation of crystal mush reservoirs.
• Branch of Science: Volcanology, Geochemistry, and Geophysics.
• Additional Detail: Unlike liquid magma lakes, supervolcano reservoirs exist as "crystal mushes" that require a thermal pulse—often an injection of primitive basalt—to remobilize and segregate the gas-rich liquid rhyolite necessary for a catastrophic eruption.

Planetary Science: In-Depth Description

Image Credit: Scientific Frontline / AI generated (Gemini)

Planetary Science is the cross-disciplinary scientific study of planets, moons, and planetary systems—including our Solar System and those orbiting other stars—aiming to understand their formation, evolution, and current physical and chemical states. By integrating principles from astronomy, geology, atmospheric science, and physics, planetary science seeks to decipher the history of matter in the solar neighborhood and determine the potential for habitability beyond Earth.

Earth Science: In-Depth Description

Image Credit: Scientific Frontline / stock image

Earth Science is the comprehensive study of the planet Earth, encompassing its physical composition, structure, the processes that shape it, and its history. Its primary goal is to understand the complex, integrated systems of our planet—including its solid land (lithosphere), water (hydrosphere), air (atmosphere), and life (biosphere)—and how they interact, change over time, and affect human life.

What Is: A Greenhouse Gas

Image Credit: Skeptical Science
(CC BY 4.0)

A greenhouse gas (GHG) is a constituent of the atmosphere that absorbs and emits longwave radiation, impeding the flow of heat from the Earth's surface into space. This process is the physical basis of the greenhouse effect, formally defined as "the infrared radiative effect of all infrared absorbing constituents in the atmosphere," which includes greenhouse gases, clouds, and some aerosols.

It is essential to distinguish between two distinct phenomena:

The Natural Greenhouse Effect: This is the baseline, life-sustaining process. Greenhouse gases, particularly water vapor and carbon dioxide, are a crucial component of the climate system. Without this natural insulating layer, the heat emitted by the Earth would "simply pass outwards... into space," and the planet's average temperature would be an uninhabitable -20°C.

The Enhanced Greenhouse Effect: This refers to the anthropogenic, or human-caused, intensification of the natural effect. The accumulation of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere, primarily from the burning of fossil fuels and other industrial and agricultural activities, is trapping additional heat, driving the rapid warming of the planet's surface and lower atmosphere.

The term "greenhouse" is a persistent and somewhat misleading analogy. A physical greenhouse primarily works by a mechanical process: its glass walls stop convection, preventing the warm air inside from rising and mixing with the colder air outside. The Earth's greenhouse effect is not a physical barrier; it is a radiative one. Greenhouse gases do not trap air. Instead, they absorb outgoing thermal radiation and re-radiate a portion of it back toward the surface, slowing the planet's ability to cool itself. This radiative mechanism, not a convective one, is how a relatively tiny fraction of the atmosphere can have a planet-altering effect.

What Is: Extinction Level Events

A Chronicle of Earth's Biotic Crises and an Assessment of Future Threats
Image Credit: Scientific Frontline

Defining Biotic Catastrophe

The history of life on Earth is a story of breathtaking diversification and innovation, but it is punctuated by chapters of profound crisis. These are the extinction level events—catastrophes of such magnitude that they fundamentally reset the planet's biological clock. Popular imagination often pictures a single, sudden event, like the asteroid that sealed the fate of the dinosaurs. The geological reality, however, is more complex and, in many ways, more instructive for our current era. Understanding these events requires a rigorous scientific framework that moves beyond simple notions of species loss to appreciate the systemic collapse of entire global ecosystems.

Geologists discover the first evidence of 4.5-billion-year-old “proto-Earth”

“This is maybe the first direct evidence that we’ve preserved the proto Earth materials,” says Nicole Nie. An artist’s illustration shows a rocky proto Earth bubbling with lava.
Image Credit: MIT News; iStock
(CC BY-NC-ND 4.0)

Scientists at MIT and elsewhere have discovered extremely rare remnants of “proto-Earth,” which formed about 4.5 billion years ago, before a colossal collision irreversibly altered the primitive planet’s composition and produced the Earth as we know today. Their findings, reported today in the journal Nature Geosciences, will help scientists piece together the primordial starting ingredients that forged the early Earth and the rest of the solar system.

Billions of years ago, the early solar system was a swirling disk of gas and dust that eventually clumped and accumulated to form the earliest meteorites, which in turn merged to form the proto-Earth and its neighboring planets.

In this earliest phase, Earth was likely rocky and bubbling with lava. Then, less than 100 million years later, a Mars-sized meteorite slammed into the infant planet in a singular “giant impact” event that completely scrambled and melted the planet’s interior, effectively resetting its chemistry. Whatever original material the proto-Earth was made from was thought to have been altogether transformed.

Understanding volcanoes better

Oldoinyo Lengai in Tanzania is the only active carbonatite volcano on Earth.
Photo Credit: © Miriam Reiss

How do volcanoes work? What happens beneath their surface? What causes the vibrations – known as tremor – that occur when magma or gases move upward through a volcano's conduits? Professor Dr. Miriam Christina Reiss, a volcano seismologist at Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz (JGU), and her team have located such tremor signals at the Oldoinyo Lengai volcano in Tanzania. "We were not only able to detect tremor, but also to determine its exact position in three dimensions – its location and depth below the surface," said Reiss. "What was particularly striking was the diversity of different tremor signals we detected." The findings provide new insights into how magma and gas are transported within the Earth and thus improve our understanding of volcanic dynamics. This also has societal relevance as the researchers hope that their work will enhance the ability to forecast volcanic eruptions in the long term. Their results have recently been published in Communications Earth & Environment.

Supercritical subsurface fluids open a window into the world

Interpreted 3D seismic characteristics.
The seal layer, interpreted by looking at data on the supercritical fluid’s movement, appears as a distinct region. It’s disrupted where it meets a fault which makes it appear porous to the fluid, allowing it to migrate upwards, causing seismic vibrations.
Image Credit: ©2025 Tsuji et al.
(CC BY 4.0)

Researchers including those from the University of Tokyo build on past studies and introduce new methods to explore the nature and role of subsurface fluids including water in the instances and behaviors of earthquakes and volcanoes. Their study suggests that water, even heavy rainfall, can play a role in or even trigger seismic events. This could potentially lead to better early warning systems. The study improves models of seismic activity and can even help identify optimal sites for drilling to tap sources of supercritical geothermal energy.

As far as is currently known, earthquakes and volcanic eruptions cannot be predicted, certainly not on the timescales with which we expect from typical weather reports. But as physical theories improve, so does the accuracy of statistical models which could be useful for planning, and potentially also early warning systems, which can save lives when disaster does strike. Another benefit of improving such models is that they could help locate areas suitable for tapping into geothermal energy. So, it’s the improvement of theories, based on good observations, that geologists and other researchers strive for. And a recent development in this field has added another factor into the mix which may be more significant than was previously thought.

Oxford researchers uncover remarkable archive of ancient human brains

Fragments of brain from an individual buried in a Victorian workhouse cemetery (Bristol, UK), some 200 years ago. No other soft tissue survived amongst the bones, which were dredged from the heavily waterlogged grave.
Photo Credit: Alexandra L. Morton-Hayward.

A new study conducted by researchers at the University of Oxford has challenged previously held views that brain preservation in the archaeological record is extremely rare. The team carried out the largest study to date of the global archaeological literature about preserved human brains to compile an archive that exceeds 20-fold the number of brains previously compiled. The findings have been published today in the Proceedings of the Royal Society B.

Soft tissue preservation in the geological record is relatively rare, and, except where deliberate intervention halts the process of decay (for instance, during embalming or freezing), the survival of entire organs is particularly unusual. The spontaneous preservation of the brain in the absence of any other soft tissues - that is, the brain’s survival amongst otherwise skeletonized remains - has historically been regarded as a ‘one-of-a kind’ phenomenon. This new research reveals, however, that nervous tissues actually persist in much greater abundances than traditionally thought, assisted by conditions that prevent decay.

Can ‘Super Volcanoes’ Cool the Earth in a Major Way? A New Study Suggests No.

Quizapu Volcano, Chile
Photo Credit: Kevin Krajick / Earth Institute

Scientific Frontline: "At a Glance" Summary

• Main Discovery: Volcanic super-eruptions likely cause significantly less global cooling than previously estimated, with temperature drops probably not exceeding 1.5°C (2.7°F) even for the most powerful events.
• Methodology: Researchers from NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies utilized advanced computer modeling to simulate climate responses to super-eruptions, specifically varying the diameter of microscopic sulfate particles injected into the stratosphere.
• Key Data: Previous estimates suggested cooling of 2°C to 8°C (3.6°F to 14.4°F), but new simulations align more closely with the 1991 Mount Pinatubo eruption, which caused a 0.5°C (1°F) drop; a super-eruption requires releasing over 1,000 cubic kilometers of magma.
• Significance: The findings explain the lack of archaeological or geological evidence for global-scale biological catastrophes following historical super-eruptions, such as the Toba event 74,000 years ago.
• Future Application: The study highlights the high level of uncertainty regarding aerosol particle behavior, suggesting that intentional geoengineering via stratospheric aerosol injection remains a non-viable climate mitigation strategy for the foreseeable future.
• Branch of Science: Earth Science, Volcanology, and Climate Modeling.
• Additional Detail: Sulfate particles influence temperature through two counteracting mechanisms: reflecting incoming solar radiation to cause cooling and trapping outgoing thermal energy to create a greenhouse effect.

Gravity data could reveal underwater volcanoes with high potential for devastating eruptions

This looping video shows an umbrella cloud generated by the underwater eruption of the Hunga Tonga-Hunga Ha’apai volcano on Jan. 15, 2022. The GOES-17 satellite captured the series of images that also show crescent-shaped shock waves and lightning strikes.
Video Credit: NASA Earth Observatory image by Joshua Stevens using GOES imagery courtesy of NOAA and NESDIS

New research led by Carnegie’s Hélène Le Mével reveals new details about the system of magma chambers under the Hunga volcano, both before and after its disastrous 2022 eruption. The team’s findings, published last week in Science Advances, demonstrate a new method for probing submarine volcanoes for their potential to cause similar damage.

The eruption came at the end of a month-long period of volcanic unrest, following a seven-year hiatus for the volcano—devastating the Kingdom of Tonga islands and causing a global tsunami, an unprecedented amount of volcanic lightning, and perturbations in the upper atmosphere. . It was the largest explosive eruption recorded since Pinatubo in 1991.

“Although we have a wealth of data about the Hunga eruption’s effects both locally and globally, we know very little about its subsurface structure,” Le Mével explained.

Recent volcanism on Mars reveals a planet more active than previously thought

This image taken by the European Space Agency's Mars Express orbiter shows an oblique view focusing on one of the vast lava flows in Elysium Planitia.
Image Credit: ESA/DLR/FU Berlin

A vast, flat, "featureless" plain on Mars surprised researchers by revealing a much more tumultuous geologic past than expected, according to a study led by researchers at the University of Arizona. Enormous amounts of lava have erupted from numerous fissures as recently as one million years ago, blanketing an area almost as large as Alaska and interacting with water in and under the surface, resulting in large flood events that carved out deep channels.

Lacking plate tectonics – shifting chunks of crust that constantly reshape Earth's surface – Mars has long been thought to be a geologically "dead" planet where not much is happening. Recent discoveries have researchers questioning this notion, however. Just last year, a team of planetary scientists, also at UArizona, presented evidence for a giant mantle plume underneath the region Elysium Planitia, driving intense volcanic and seismic activity in a relatively recent past.

In the most recent study, a team led by Joana Voigt and Christopher Hamilton at UArizona's Lunar and Planetary Laboratory combined spacecraft images and measurements from ground-penetrating radar to reconstruct in three-dimensional detail every individual lava flow in Elysium Planitia. The extensive survey revealed and documented more than 40 volcanic events, with one of the largest flows infilling a valley named Athabasca Valles with almost 1,000 cubic miles of basalt.

Researchers probe molten rock to crack Earth’s deepest secrets

Deep inside rocky planets like Earth, the behavior of iron can greatly affect the properties of molten rock materials: properties that influenced how Earth formed and evolved. Scientists used powerful lasers and ultrafast X-rays to recreate the extreme conditions in these molten rock materials, called silicate melts, and measure properties of iron. 
Illustration Credit: Greg Stewart/SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory

Deep inside rocky planets like Earth, the behavior of iron can greatly affect the properties of molten rock materials: properties that influenced how Earth formed and evolved. 

In fact, the evolution of our entire planet may be driven by the microscopic quantum state of these iron atoms. One special feature of iron is its “spin state,” which is a quantum property of the electrons in each iron atom that drives their magnetic behavior and reactivity in chemical reactions. Changes in the spin state can influence whether iron prefers to be in the molten rock or in solid form and how well the molten rock conducts electricity.

Until now, it’s been challenging to recreate the extreme conditions in these molten rock materials, called silicate melts, to measure the spin state of iron. Using powerful lasers and ultrafast X-rays, an international team of researchers at the Department of Energy’s SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory, Stanford University, Universite ́ Grenoble Alpes, Laboratoire pour l’Utilisation des Lasers Intenses (LULI), and Arizona State University overcame this challenge. They showed that at extremely high pressures and temperatures, the iron in silicate melts mostly has a low-spin state, meaning its electrons stay closer to the center and pair up in their energy levels, making the iron less magnetic and more stable.

Navigating underground with cosmic-ray muons

Navigating inside with muons. The red line in this image represents the path the “navigatee” walked, while the white line with dots shows the path recorded by MuWNS.
Illustration Credit: ©2023 Hiroyuki K.M. Tanaka

Superfast, subatomic-sized particles called muons have been used to wirelessly navigate underground in a reportedly world first. By using muon-detecting ground stations synchronized with an underground muon-detecting receiver, researchers at the University of Tokyo were able to calculate the receiver’s position in the basement of a six-story building. As GPS cannot penetrate rock or water, this new technology could be used in future search and rescue efforts, to monitor undersea volcanoes, and guide autonomous vehicles underground and underwater.

GPS, the global positioning system, is a well-established navigation tool and offers an extensive list of positive applications, from safer air travel to real-time location mapping. However, it has some limitations. GPS signals are weaker at higher latitudes and can be jammed or spoofed (where a counterfeit signal replaces an authentic one). Signals can also be reflected off surfaces like walls, interfered with by trees, and can’t pass through buildings, rock or water.

Are Earth and Venus the only volcanic planets? Not anymore.

LP 791-18 d is an Earth-size world about 90 light-years away. The gravitational tug from a more massive planet in the system, shown as a blue disk in the background, may result in internal heating and volcanic eruptions – as much as Jupiter’s moon Io, the most geologically active body in the solar system.
Illustration Credit: NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center/Chris Smith/KRBwyle

Scientific Frontline: "At a Glance" Summary

• Main Discovery: The identification of LP 791-18 d, an Earth-sized exoplanet orbiting a red dwarf star 90 light-years away, which is likely covered in active volcanoes due to intense gravitational heating.
• Methodology: Researchers utilized photometric data from NASA’s Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS) and the retired Spitzer Space Telescope to detect the planet and analyze its orbit, specifically measuring transit timing variations caused by the gravitational tug of a larger neighboring planet, LP 791-18 c.
• Key Data: LP 791-18 d has a radius and mass consistent with Earth (approximately 1.03 Earth radii and 0.9 Earth masses) and orbits its host star every 2.8 days; its massive neighbor passes as close as 1.5 million kilometers, generating sufficient tidal friction to fuel volcanic activity comparable to Jupiter’s moon Io.
• Significance: This finding provides a rare analog for studying the long-term evolution of terrestrial planets and how extensive volcanic outgassing can sustain an atmosphere on tidally locked worlds, potentially allowing water to condense on the planet's dark side.
• Future Application: The planet serves as a prime target for the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) to conduct atmospheric spectroscopy, aiming to detect potential biosignatures or volcanic gases like sulfur dioxide.
• Branch of Science: Exoplanetary Astronomy, Planetary Science.
• Additional Detail: The planet is tidally locked, meaning one side faces the star permanently, but the suspected global volcanic activity could transport heat and maintain an atmosphere across the night side.

Most species, including humans, who experience early life adversity suffer as adults. How are gorillas different?

Experienced the loss of her mother and father and the disintegration of her family group before the age of 5. Now 20, she has become a successful mother, raising three offspring.
Photo Credit: Dian Fossey Gorilla Fund

There’s something most species—from baboons to humans to horses—have in common: When they suffer serious adversity early in life, they’re more likely to experience hardship later on in life.

When researchers from the Dian Fossey Gorilla Fund and the University of Michigan decided to look at this question in gorillas, they weren’t sure what they would find.

Previous studies by the Fossey Fund revealed that young gorillas are surprisingly resilient to losing their mothers, in contrast to what has been found in many other species. But losing your mother is only one of many potential bad things that can happen to young animals.

“Assuming that you survive something that we consider early life adversity, it’s often still the case that you will be less healthy or you will have fewer kids or your lifespan will be shorter—no matter what species you are,” said Stacy Rosenbaum, U-M assistant professor of anthropology and senior author of the study. “There’s this whole range of things that happens to you that seems to just make your life worse in adulthood.”