Despite the misinformation about sunscreen, you may be See onlineancient humans faced problems from the harmful rays of the sun. Ancient Homo sapiens Approximately 40,000 years ago, it may have benefited from the same technology used to avoid sunburn today. It uses moon sunscreen, tailored clothing, caves in shade and shelter. These advancements may have been particularly advantageous when Earth’s magnetic poles were switched a bit. Research published in the journal on April 16th Advances in science.
The history of Earth’s polarity reversal
The Earth’s magnetic field is created by its rotation and the rotation of the planet’s core. A core made of molten iron produces current. These currents extend a kind of halo all over the world that helps protect the Earth from cosmic radiation. This radiation blocks the Earth’s ozone layer, inputs more ultraviolets (UV), and interactions between these particles and the Earth’s magnetic field also lead to auroras.
Currently, this magnetic field has north and south directions in the form of the Earth’s north and Antarctic. This is why we see auroras in areas near the poles where the magnetic field is usually the strongest.
Occasionally, these poles wander from traditional geographical locations. These are called geomagnetic excursions. This natural process has occurred about 180 times in our planet’s 4.5 billion years of geological history. Scientists believe it is caused by some Instability of the process that generates the Earth’s magnetic field.
The latest geomagnetic field trip was called the Lasshamp field trip and occurred about 41-42,000 years ago. During this reversal, the magnetic field became weaker, causing most of the Earth’s aurora, allowing more harmful UV rays to enter from space.
[ Related: A geomagnetic curveball 42,000 years ago changed our planet forever. ]
Around the same time, archaeological evidence shows that Homo sapiens Perhaps he was making tailored clothing for himself and using pigments called ochre more often. The ochre itself has the properties of protecting the sun when applied to the skin, and with the declining Neanderthal population, it may have helped spread ancient humans throughout today’s Europe and Asia.
“This study combined all areas where no magnetic fields were connected to each other, allowing any kind of energy particles to penetrate the ground from the cosmic radiation, or the sun.” said in a statement. “We found that many of these regions were in fact very closely coincided with early human activities 41,000 years ago, particularly the increased use of caves and the increased use of prehistoric sunscreens.”
Clues from the universe weather
The team has built a model for the interaction between spatial particles and the Earth’s magnetic field Space Weather Modeling Framework. Mukhopadhyay has developed a model to predict how this plasma system interacts with the Earth’s magnetic field, which forms a dense aurora.
In collaboration with Sanja Panovska of the GFZ Helmholtz Center for Geosciences in Germany, Mukhopadhyay created a 3D reconstruction of Earth’s geospatial system. They combined Three separate models: A global model that reconstructs the geomagnetic field during a Las Shamp Excursion, one model of the spatial plasma environment around the Earth, and another model that predicts what Earth’s aurora would look like back then. The resulting 3D model showed where charged particles were able to slip through the Earth’s magnetic field.
Between Laschamps ExcursionEarth’s magnetic field has decreased in size to about 10% Current strength. As a result, the Earth’s magnetic poles droop near the equator, increasing the magnetic field lines. This expansion meant that the Aurora could be visible across Europe and North Africa.
When the team built 3D maps of Earth’s space systems around the world, they discovered that the duration of the Laschamp excursion coincided with the period of change in the group of human groups living on Earth.
Clothes make (hu) man
Homo sapiens Neanderthals coexisted in Europe about 56,000 years ago. However, Neanderthals were no longer identified as European species by about 40,000 years ago.
“The differences between these species between Neanderthals and anatomically modern humans may explain that their loss of disappear has been a major anthropological problem for decades,” says Raven Garvey, an anthropologist at the University of Michigan. said in a statement.
Garvey suggests that the clothing itself may be a major species difference. The technical means of creating perfect clothing for the body has been discovered in archaeological locations anatomically related to modern humans, but not necessarily where Neanderthals lived.
Archaeologists have discovered scrapers used to produce skin, as well as needles and AWLs needed for sewing at sites that are anatomically related to modern humans. According to Garvey, such tailored clothing has been significantly warmer. This added warmth meant that people could move further to find food and provide protection from the damage to the sun, she said.
[ Related: Ice age humans made needles from animal bones, archeologists discover. ]
Because of multiple harmful effects of solar radiation Child mortality rates may increase“Having protection against solar radiation would have given a great advantage to those who owned it,” Garvey said.
Furthermore, ancient humans may have enhanced their use of ochre. This naturally occurring pigment is made up of iron oxide, clay and silica. It has been used by several types of humanity over thousands of years. People used it to paint objects on the walls of the cave, and even adorned their bodies.
“There were some experimental tests that showed sunscreen-like properties. It’s a very effective sunscreen, and there are also ethnographic populations that used it primarily for that purpose,” Garvey said. “The increased production and its association with mostly anatomically modern humans (in Laschamp) also suggests that they used it for this purpose.”
Living in a different atmosphere
According to the teamthese findings are inconclusive, but provide new ways to view already existing data.
“I think it’s important to note that these findings are correlated and (ours) are meta-analyses,” Garvey said. “But I think that’s a new perspective on these data in light of the Lasshamp field trip.”
3D models provide a way to predict how future excursions will affect us. If such a reversal occurred today, we could see a complete power outage, disrupted communication, when the communication satellite was not working. These types of events already occur even during smaller spatial weather events.
The work also highlights how humans were able to survive on planets that look very different from what we are today.
“Many people say that planets cannot sustain life without a strong magnetic field,” Mukopadyai said. “Looking at prehistoric Earth, especially events like this, can help us study unfolding physics from very different vantage points. Life existed back then, but that was a little different from today.”