
-
Angel Correa leaves Atletico for Mexican club Tigres
-
Thunder's Holmgren agrees to contract extension worth up to $250 mn: reports
-
Evenepoel triumphs in Tour de France time trial as Pogacar slips into yellow
-
Trump issues more letters to countries in push for tariff deals
-
Fears grow that Texas floods death toll could surge
-
Yemen's Huthis claim deadly Red Sea attack on merchant ship
-
Putellas going with flow in dominant Spain's Euro 2025 charge
-
Copper giant Chile awaits 'official' news on US tariff raise
-
Pant says keeping to Bumrah even tougher than facing the India star
-
X chief Yaccarino steps down after two years
-
Trump hosts African leaders in landmark trade-focused summit
-
Greece to halt asylum hearings for migrants on boats from Africa
-
Ex-Real Madrid coach Ancelotti gets year's jail for tax fraud
-
Bencic beats Andreeva to reach first Wimbledon semi-final
-
Fears grow that Texas floods death toll could still surge
-
Six rescued from cargo ship attacked in Red Sea: EU naval force
-
Searching for Grandma Alicia after Texas floods
-
Lyon stave off relegation after successful appeal
-
Israel FM says Hamas truce deal 'achievable' despite hurdles in talks
-
Christian Horner - a brutal end to a rollercoaster reign at Red Bull
-
Swiatek gets 'goosebumps' after reaching first Wimbledon semi-final
-
Zelensky talks peace with pope ahead of Ukraine conference
-
Christian Horner - a brutal end to a spicy reign at Red Bull
-
Dozens of sites vie for UNESCO world heritage list spot
-
Swiatek into first Wimbledon semi-final
-
Syrian designer Rami Al Ali to make history at Paris Couture Week
-
'Hothead' Fognini announces retirement from tennis
-
Werner unveiled as first new Leipzig coach in Klopp era
-
Zelensky talks peace with pope ahead of Ukraine recovery conference
-
Musk's chatbot Grok slammed for praising Hitler, dishing insults
-
Another Lions injury worry after fullback Kinghorn limps off
-
Rider quits Tour de France after cycling 174km with fractured shoulder
-
Top European rights court finds Russia committed abuses in Ukraine
-
Inspired Queensland upset NSW to snatch State of Origin crown
-
Lions tame gutsy Brumbies for fourth straight win on Australia tour
-
Red Bull sack F1 team chief Horner
-
Demna bows out at Balenciaga with star-studded Paris catwalk show
-
Lions tame gutsy Brumbies to make it four straight wins
-
Djokovic eyes Wimbledon history, wounded Sinner in spotlight
-
European stocks brush off Trump's copper, pharma tariff threats
-
France police raid far-right party offices over campaign financing
-
Commerzbank commits to strategy as UniCredit ups direct stake
-
Deadly temperatures blasted western Europe in record hot June
-
Volkswagen US deliveries fall as Trump tariffs bite
-
England recall Archer after injury exile for third Test against India
-
Red Bull sack team chief Horner after two decades in charge
-
Macron turns to politics on second day of UK state visit
-
Ukraine says Russia launched largest drone, missile attack of war
-
Red Bull sack team chief Horner afer two decades in charge
-
Toll of Air India disaster rests at 260 as focus turns to crash report

Chimps are upping their tool game, says study
"Planet of the Apes" may have been onto something.
Chimpanzees are steadily honing their tool-using skills -- a process unfolding over millennia, driven by the exchange of ideas through migrations between populations, according to a new study published Thursday in Science.
The finding in chimps -- humans' closest living relatives -- holds relevance for us too, as it supports the idea that, deep in the mists of time, our own ape ancestors leveraged social connections to improve their technologies, lead author Cassandra Gunasekaram told AFP.
Scientists have long marveled at chimps' ability to pass down intricate behaviors, like tool use, from one generation to the next.
Yet while human civilization has leapt from the Stone Age to the Space Age, chimpanzee "culture" -- defined as socially learned behaviors -- seemed to have remained static.
Gunasekaram, a doctoral student at the University of Zurich, set out to challenge this assumption.
- Connections spark innovation -
She and colleagues combined genetic data tracing ancient chimpanzee migrations across Africa with observations of 15 distinct foraging behaviors across dozens of populations and the four subspecies.
These behaviors were categorized into three levels: those requiring no tools, those with simple tools, like using chewed leaves as a sponge to absorb water from tree holes, and the most complex, which involve toolsets.
One striking example of toolset use comes from Congo, where chimps use a stout stick to bore a tunnel into the ground to reach a termite nest, then modify a plant stem by chewing its tip into a brush to "fish" for termites in the tunnel they've made.
The study found that advanced tool use strongly correlated with populations connected by genetic exchanges over the last 5,000–15,000 years, suggesting such behaviors spread when groups interacted.
Areas where three subspecies overlap exhibited the most complex tool use, highlighting how cross-group connections foster cultural knowledge.
By contrast, simpler behaviors, such as foraging without tools, seemed less tied to migration and likely evolved independently in different regions.
- Foraging efficiently -
Gunasekaram said this mirrors how trading ideas and incremental innovation have been critical to human technological progress, taking us from early abacuses to modern smartphones.
"They've become so complex that one person alone could not reinvent them from scratch," she said.
But unlike humans, chimps have far fewer opportunities to encounter new individuals and ideas -- migrations occur gradually, driven by sexually mature females moving to new communities to avoid inbreeding.
Analyzing ancient genetic flows helped the team overcome one of the biggest challenges in studying the evolution of chimpanzee culture: the limited window of observation, as the species has only been researched scientifically for about a century.
What's more, "Chimpanzee tools are made of sticks and stems, which are all perishable," Gunasekaram explained, making it nearly impossible to trace how their artifacts have evolved over time.
So, will chimps one day rival human ingenuity? Hardly. But given enough time, they could become more efficient foragers.
For example, some populations are already more advanced in cracking nuts with hammers and anvils made of stone , and one particularly innovative group has even invented a stabilizer for the anvil, said Gunasekaram.
P.Stevenson--AMWN