HEAD CASES: 5 SKULLS THAT SHOOK UP THE STORY OF HUMAN EVOLUTION. (cover story)

FEATURES Researchers have added four new members to the genus Homo: South Africa's Homo naledi, Asia's Denisovans, Indonesia's "hobbit" H. floresiensis and, just last year, its neighbor in the Philippines, H. luzonensis. Much of the new research involves high-tech analysis of fragmentary fossils or genetic code - but no single tooth, scrap of finger bone or shiny piece of lab equipment captures our attention quite like a skull. "Our mindsets are like shop display windows that separate us from the mannequins: We look at these fossil skulls through our own mirror images and imaginations", Zollikofer says. [Extracted from the article]