Latest news with #VanceHolliday
Yomiuri Shimbun
04-07-2025
- Science
- Yomiuri Shimbun
Evidence Backs Theory of Humans in Americas over 20,000 Years Ago
A line of evidence is providing further corroboration of the antiquity of fossilized footprints discovered at White Sands National Park in New Mexico that rewrite the history of humans in the Americas. Researchers used a technique called radiocarbon dating to determine that organic matter in the remains of wetland muds and shallow lake sediments near the fossilized foot impressions is between 20,700 and 22,400 years old. That closely correlates to previous findings, based on the age of pollen and seeds at the site, that the tracks are between 21,000 and 23,000 years old. The footprints, whose discovery was announced in 2021, indicate that humans trod the landscape of North America thousands of years earlier than previously thought, during the most inhospitable conditions of the last Ice Age, a time called the last glacial maximum. The age of the footprints has been a contentious issue. Asked how the new findings align with the previous ones, University of Arizona archaeologist and geologist Vance Holliday, the study leader, replied: 'Spectacularly well.' Homo sapiens arose in Africa roughly 300,000 years ago and later spread worldwide. Scientists believe our species entered North America from Asia by trekking across a land bridge that once connected Siberia to Alaska. Previous archaeological evidence had suggested that human occupation of North America started roughly 16,000 years ago. The hunter-gatherers who left the tracks were traversing the floodplain of a river that flowed into an ancient body of water called Lake Otero. The mud through which they walked included bits of semi-aquatic plants that had grown in these wetlands. Radiocarbon dating is used to determine the age of organic material based on the decay of an isotope called carbon-14, a variant of the element carbon. Living organisms absorb carbon-14 into their tissue. After an organism dies, this isotope changes into other atoms over time, providing a metric for determining age. 'Three separate carbon sources — pollen, seeds and organic muds and sediments — have now been dated by different radiocarbon labs over the course of the trackway research, and they all indicate a last glacial maximum age for the footprints,' said Jason Windingstad, a University of Arizona doctoral candidate in environmental science and coauthor of the study published last month in the journal Science Advances. The original 2021 study dated the footprints using radiocarbon dating on seeds of an aquatic plant called spiral ditchgrass found alongside the tracks. A study published in 2023 used radiocarbon dating on conifer pollen grains from the same sediment layers as the ditchgrass seeds. But some scientists had viewed the seeds and pollen as unreliable markers for dating the tracks. The new study provides further corroboration of the dating while also giving a better understanding of the local landscape at the time. 'When the original paper appeared, at the time we didn't know enough about the ancient landscape because it was either buried under the White Sands dune field or was destroyed when ancient Lake Otero, which had a lot of gypsum, dried out after the last Ice Age and was eroded by the wind to create the dunes,' Holliday said. Today, the landscape situated just west of the city of Alamogordo consists of rolling beige-colored dunes of the mineral gypsum. 'The area of and around the tracks included water that came off the mountains to the east, the edge of the old lake and wetlands along the margins of the lake. Our dating shows that this environment persisted before, during and after the time that people left their tracks,' Holliday said. The area could have provided important resources for hunter-gatherers. 'We know from the abundant tracks in the area that at least mammoths, giant ground sloths, camels and dire wolves were around, and likely other large animals. Given the setting, there must have been a large variety of other animals and also plants,' Holliday added. The climate was markedly different than today, with cooler summers and the area receiving significantly more precipitation. 'It is important to note that this is a trackway site, not a habitation site,' Windingstad said. 'It provides us a narrow view of people traveling across the landscape. Where they were going and where they came from is obviously an open question and one that requires the discovery and excavation of sites that are of similar age in the region. So far, these have not been found.'
Daily Mirror
01-07-2025
- Science
- Daily Mirror
Footprints lead to discovery of mystery 23,000-year-old culture in breakthrough
The discovery of a mysterious culture're path through the White Sands National Park pushes the understanding of North American human history back by 10,000 years A "remarkable" archaeology breakthrough has placed humans in North America 10,000 years earlier than previously thought, upending decades of established understanding. Researchers have analysed sets of fossilised footprints found in the arid White Sands National Park, a significant archaeological site in New Mexico, and discovered that a mysterious group of people walked the area's ancient lakebeds between 21,000 and 23,000 years ago. The new project has challenged a nearly 100-year-old consensus that the Clovis, an archaeological culture, were the first human inhabitants on the continent, with breakthroughs in 1929 suggesting the settlers had been present there 13,000 years ago. READ MORE: Archaeologists baffled as they uncover 'mystery' 3,600-year-old Pharaoh's tomb in Egypt Researchers involved in the study, which was published in Science Advances, used radiocarbon dating on ancient mud layers at the site which contained the footprints, and had their results corroborated by independent laboratories. They found three types of material - mud, seeds and pollen - which were dated by three separate labs, all of which produced consistent results. For the latest study, lead researcher Vance Holliday, a University of Arizona archaeologist and geologist, and Jason Windingstad, a doctoral candidate in environmental science, returned to White Sands in 2022 and 2023. There they dug a new series of trenches for a closer look at the geology of the lake beds, with Professor Holliday hailing the accuracy of the "remarkable" record. He said: "It's a remarkably consistent record. You get to the point where it's really hard to explain all this away. As I say in the paper, it would be serendipity in the extreme to have all these dates giving you a consistent picture that's in error." Mr Windingstad said: "It's a strange feeling when you go out there and look at the footprints and see them in person. "You realise that it basically contradicts everything that you've been taught about the peopling of North America." Professor Holliday said the footprints suggested early hunter-gatherers may have briefly visited the area, as they left no artefacts or settlements. The discovery rewrites a significant chapter in the story of human migration to the Americas, offering the earliest direct evidence of people on the continent and prompting fresh debate about how and when the first Americans arrived. Researchers from Bournemouth University and the US National Park Service excavated the footprints in 2019 and published their paper in 2021. They were formed in soft mud on the margins of a shallow lake that, in the 21st century, forms part of Alkali Flat, a large playa in the White Sands, Bournemouth University's study explained. They appeared to have primarily come from teenagers andyounger children, with occasional adults interspersed among the crowd of travelling hunter-gatherers. Humans weren't the only people believed to have made tracks, however, with ancient megafauna also detected, including gian ground sloth, dire wolves and some birds.
Yahoo
30-06-2025
- Science
- Yahoo
Experts Found 23,000-Year-Old Human Footprints Where They Shouldn't Exist
Here's what you'll learn when you read this story: Researchers determined that footprints in White Sands National Park in New Mexico are from the oldest migrants to North America. The footprints first made headlines after a study published in 2021 claimed that they were thousands of years older than the Clovis people of New Mexico, who had long been thought to be the first North American culture. Who these nomadic people were—or whether they stayed in New Mexico or moved on—is still unknown. An endless ocean of white sprawling across New Mexico's Tularosa Basin, White Sands National Park glitters with dunes of gypsum sand. From those sands have surfaced footprints that would rewrite human history. Found in ancient clay that had long since hardened to stone, the footprints were thought to be anywhere from 21,000 to 23,000 years old. Controversy surrounded the finding—if these tracks really were that ancient, it would mean that they were even older than the Clovis people from the late Pleistocene, whose name comes from a site in New Mexico that was thought to be the oldest known settlement in North America. Whether or not these tracks really did predate the Clovis culture would be debated for years until the investigation was reopened. Archaeologist and geologist Vance Holliday—now a professor emeritus at the University of Arizona—started researching the geologic strata of White Sands in 2012. In 2019, researchers from Bournemouth University in the UK teamed up with the U.S. National Park Service for the excavation that resulted in the discovery of the footprints, and some of Vance's data on the ages of seeds and pollen in the area was used to date the prints for a study published in 2021. If the age of the footprints was correct, that would make them 10,000 years older than the Clovis people. With doubts surrounding that study, Vance became determined to prove their age, and finally succeeded by dating the mud rock they were imprinted on. 'The issue of the arrival of the first Americans has long been contentious and the record from the White Sands locality generated considerable debate focused on the validity of the dating,' he said in a new study recently published in the journal Science Advances. The age of the footprints coincides with the final phase of the Pleistocene epoch, otherwise known as the Last Glacial Maximum. Ice sheets that blocked the Bering Land Bridge between Asia and North America made human migration impossible. This could potentially mean that the first people to settle in North America crossed over before Earth plunged into a deep freeze—a time period which aligns with the age of the footprints, as confirmed by Vance. What is now the Tularosa Basin was once the bottom of a paleolake called Lake Otero that formed after the snow and ice melted. Flows of melted snow brought dissolved gypsum to Lake Otero, which emerged as an expanse of white sand when the lake evaporated into a dry playa. Erosion may have erased some of this history forever, but beneath the sand, fossils of megafauna like mammoths and ground sloths were still preserved—alongside the controversial footprints. Whoever made these prints traveled through marshlands before Lake Otero formed and walked through gley—mud that is too waterlogged for oxygen to penetrate. Organisms in the mud instead turn to iron and manganese compounds in this mud to survive, chemically breaking down these compounds and turning the mud shades of blue, green, or gray. The gley was radiocarbon dated to anywhere between 20,700 and 22,400 years old, supporting previous findings that came close to that range. Before this, Vance had relied on pollen remnants and the seeds of the aquatic plant Ruppia cirrhosa (also known as spiral tasselweed or ditchgrass) to date the impressions. 'At the time that the human tracks were created […] there was an extensive body of standing but shallow water or wetlands in proximity to the trackways throughout the period of human activity,' Vance said. If this is proof of what could be the first humans who migrated to the Americas, then why did they only leave footprints? The absence of artifacts might be explained by nomadic life. Vance thinks that one of the trackways was easily walked over in only seconds, and hunter-gatherers might have only been passing through the basin while holding onto tools and supplies that were not easily replaced. Who these enigmatic people were remains a mystery burried in the sands of time. You Might Also Like Can Apple Cider Vinegar Lead to Weight Loss? Bobbi Brown Shares Her Top Face-Transforming Makeup Tips for Women Over 50
International Business Times
29-06-2025
- Science
- International Business Times
Scientists Discover Ghostly 23,000-Year-Old Human Footprints in New Mexico; Origin Timeline to be Rewritten?
There is proof that people have been roaming the Americas for at least 20,000 years in the White Sands, a vast area of undulating gypsum dunes left by ancient seas in New Mexico. A portion of White Sands is under US army control as a missile range, but the majority of the area is protected as a national park. Researchers discovered clay footprints in this region that were preserved beneath the gypsum and have altered the chronology of human habitation in the Americas. In the past, we believed that humans first appeared in North America between 13,200 and 15,500 years ago. But according to a recent study led by Vance Holliday, an archeologist from the University of Arizona, and published in Science Advances, the footprints are between 20,700 and 22,400 years old based on evidence from mud, Ruppia seeds, and pollen discovered in layers above and below the trace fossils. This indicates that during the last Ice Age, people crossed a floodplain on the edges of the now-gone Lake Otero, which formerly occupied about 4,140 square kilometers (1,600 square miles) of the Tularosa Basin. Holliday and his colleagues said, "Pleistocene lakes and associated biological resources in western and southwestern North America must have attracted foragers, but archaeologists have surveyed few paleolake basins." When the footprints were first found in 2021, embedded seeds and pollen were dated between 21,000 and 23,000 years ago. However, since these biomaterials are lightweight and easily moved in such a dynamic ecosystem, some questioned the method used to determine the age of the footprints. However, the new study discovered that mud layer analysis supports the information provided by plant traces. "Most of this dating of organic matter from palustrine muds complement the dating of the seeds and pollen previously reported," the authors stated in the report. Holliday said, "It would be serendipity in the extreme to have all these dates giving you a consistent picture that's in error."
Yahoo
29-06-2025
- Science
- Yahoo
Recent study supports dates of early human footprints at White Sands National Park
WHITE SANDS, N.M. (KRQE) – What if humans left their first mark on the Americas earlier than we think? An anthropologist said footprints uncovered here in the Land of Enchantment tell a new story. It's one of the world's great natural wonders. At White Sands National Park, tiny gypsum grains sparkle as they reflect the sun. But under the surface, you'll find human history etched below. 'It now gives us a bigger picture, a better picture of what was going on out there,' said Vance Holliday, Professor Emeritus of Anthropology and Geosciences at the University of Arizona. Fossilized human footprints discovered at the park in 2021 led archaeologists to believe humans were in North America before the end of the ice age, roughly 23,000 years ago. That's 10,000 years before remains at a site near Clovis, New Mexico were dated. These productions were filmed at White Sands. Have you seen them? Some scientists pushed for more research to confirm the findings, arguing the dates could give ages that are too old because of aquatic material. But a new study by Professor Vance Holliday joins others in supporting the prehistoric case. 'We've got a total of about 55 dates on three different materials run by three different labs, and everything matches up,' said Holliday. Holliday said the evidence is clear: 'I just don't see any other explanation.' What gives the sand at White Sands National Park its color? The discovery completely reshapes what anthropologists believe about how and when North America was populated by early humans. 'The age of the tracks is when North America was blocked off from Asia by glacial ice sheets,' said Holliday. Professor Holliday emphasizes the value of looking at the tracks as he recounted his first day at the park in 2012, coming face to face with mammoth, sloth, camel, and dire wolf tracks. 'They're all over the place. It is amazing. And that alone is this incredible resource,' said Holliday. So, what once held prehistoric streams, wetlands, and lakes now holds the secrets of the past, as man traveled across North America. Professor Holliday said part of the history we won't be able to find out because of wind erosion. Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
