Today, more than 200 million people worldwide are infected with the parasitic worms that cause schistosomiasis. But where did the disease come from? Researchers think that they might have found a clue ...

Researchers estimate that irrigation began as early as 6000 B.C. The Egyptians irrigated their crops from the Nile River by flooding their cropland every spring then draining the water back into the ...

Scientific American is part of Springer Nature, which owns or has commercial relations with thousands of scientific publications (many of them can be found at www ...

A new study published in PLOS One suggests that the first great cities of Sumer may have been built on tides, not canals. Researchers argue that freshwater tidal flows from the Persian Gulf created a ...

The story of how the first cities rose from southern Mesopotamia has long fascinated scientists and historians. Many explanations point to fertile soil, farming, and trade networks as the engines of ...