PORTUGAL: A 400,000-year-old partial skull buried in the Gruta da Aroeira cave in central Portugal is the oldest human fossil ever found in Portugal and the westernmost in Europe dating to the Middle Pleistocene. The deposit in which the cranium was embedded also contains stone tools, faunal remains, and burned bones. Because the skull displays a unique combination of physical characteristics, experts are hoping it can provide important new information about human evolution in Europe and the origins of Neanderthals. —Jason Urbanus