The discovery of “Pink” from Atapuerca among the top human evolution milestones of 2025 according to Smithsonian Magazine

The discovery of the human facial fragment known as “Pink”, from the Sima del Elefante site (Atapuerca, Burgos, Spain), has been highlighted by Smithsonian Magazine among the major scientific milestones in human evolution of 2025.

The article, titled “The Top Human Evolution Discoveries of 2025, From the Intriguing Neanderthal Diet to the Oldest Western European Face Fossil”, includes the Atapuerca fossil as one of the most significant discoveries of the year in this field.

According to this publication, the facial fragment, dated between 1.4 and 1.1 million years old, represents the oldest human face known so far in Western Europe and shows a morphology closer to Homo erectus than to Homo antecessor, which has been documented in more recent levels of the same archaeological complex.

The study, published in the journal Nature, was led by researcher Rosa Huguet and included a significant contribution from researchers at IPHES-CERCA. The fossil, catalogued as ATE7-1 and popularly known as “Pink”, provides new data on the earliest human populations that reached Europe during the Early Pleistocene and on the diversity of hominins present on the continent at that time.

Its inclusion in this annual overview by Smithsonian Magazine, the official magazine of the Smithsonian Institution of the United States, a global reference in scientific research and outreach, highlights the global impact of this discovery and reinforces the role of the Atapuerca sites and IPHES-CERCA as leading institutions in the study of the earliest human settlements in Europe.