Laura Geggel
Laura Geggel

Laura is an editor at Live Science. She edits Life's Little Mysteries and reports on general science, including archaeology and animals. Her work has appeared in The New York Times, Scholastic, Popular Science and Spectrum, a site on autism research. She has won multiple awards from the Society of Professional Journalists and the Washington Newspaper Publishers Association for her reporting at a weekly newspaper near Seattle. Laura holds a bachelor's degree in English literature and psychology from Washington University in St. Louis and an advanced certificate in science writing from NYU.

Articles by: Laura Geggel

A digitally enhanced panorama of the warty pigs at Leang Tedongnge Cave, in Sulawesi, Indonesia.

Warty pig is oldest animal cave art on record

By Laura Geggel

A 45,500-year-old warty pig drawing is the oldest known cave painting of an animal on record.

Farmers found the 500-year-old statue of mysterious woman (left), who has a headdress that looks like the head ornamentation of "Star Wars" former Jedi apprentice Ahsoka Tano (right), whose Hasbro action figure is shown here.

Statue of mysterious woman with 'Star Wars'-like headdress found in Mexico

By Laura Geggel

A 500-year-old limestone statue of an elite woman was found in central Mexico.

A model showing how warm (red) air may impact the cold (blue) polar vortex that swirls over the North Pole.

Wandering polar vortex may cause a wild, snowy winter

By Laura Geggel

A polar vortex disruption may cause snowy, cold weather in about two weeks.

National Guard troops clear a street from protestors outside the Capitol building on Jan. 6, 2021 in Washington, D.C.

10 times the US capital weathered political violence

By Laura Geggel

From violent attacks on politicians, to a raging fire, to explosions, to indiscriminate shooting, Washington D.C. has seen its share of darkness.

Kualoa Regional Park, Oahu, Hawaii

Blue UFO soars over Hawaii before crashing into the sea

By Laura Geggel

Multiple people saw a strange blue light whiz over Oahu, Hawaii.

The Roman engraving likely dates to the second century A.D.

Woman's garden 'stepping stone' turns out to be an ancient Roman artifact

By Laura Geggel

Nobody knows how this 1,800-year-old Roman carving ended up in an English garden.

Yellowstone's Steamboat Geyser blows steam during a 2019 eruption.

Yellowstone's reawakened geyser won't spark a volcanic 'big one'

By Laura Geggel

Why a reawakened geyser isn't worrying geologists.

A boy sits in front of museum skeletons

10 things we learned about our human ancestors in 2020

By Laura Geggel

Some human ancestors are known only as "ghost" populations.

The dead giant squid (Architeuthis dux) found on Golden Mile Beach in Britannia Bay, South Africa.

10 strange animals that washed ashore in 2020

By Laura Geggel

Here are 10 gnarly animals from our ocean's depths.

The 10 barbed points from Doggerland and the places they were discovered in the Netherlands.

Weapons carved from human bone come from drowned land bridge between UK and Europe

By Laura Geggel

It's a mystery why hunter-gatherers from the Stone Age crafted weapons from human bone.

The newly described "reaper of death" is a cousin of Tyrannosaurus rex.

The 10 coolest dinosaur findings of 2020

By Laura Geggel

Here's what we've learned about dinosaurs in 2020.

Archaeologists found an infant jar burial about 10 feet (3 meters) under street level in Jaffa, which dated to the middle Bronze Age II.

3,800-year-old baby in a jar unearthed in Israel

By Laura Geggel

Jaffa's 4,000-year-old history is buried beneath its streets.

People look toward the sun at Stonehenge, as they take part in a winter solstice ceremony at the ancient neolithic monument in England.

Here's the science of the winter solstice

By Laura Geggel

Today's winter solstice will boast the year's fewest hours of daylight for the Northern Hemisphere. Here's why.

The 48 million-year-old fossil python discovered in Germany.

World's oldest python fossil unearthed

By Laura Geggel

The discovery of the world's oldest python fossils on record suggests that these snakes originated in Europe and probably lived alongside boas.

Skulls discovered at the Aztec 'trophy' excavation site in 2015.

Giant Aztec skull 'tower' unearthed in Mexico

By Laura Geggel

More than 500 years ago, the Aztecs created a "trophy tower" out of hundreds of human skulls.

Whoever inscribed this altar went outside the rectangular box and shrank the letters, too.

1,800-year-old altar to pagan god Pan hidden in a Byzantine church

By Laura Geggel

Archaeologists in Israel have found an ancient altar to Pan that was repurposed as a brick in a church wall.

A newfound stash of 63 gold and one silver coin dates from the time of Edward IV to Henry VIII.

Gold coin stash from time of Henry VIII found in English garden

By Laura Geggel

A family pulling weeds in the garden discovered a hoard of gold coins featuring various British monarchs dating back to the 1400s.

Lagerpetids, including the species Ixalerpeton (illustrated here), may be close relatives of pterosaurs.

Missing link in pterosaur origins discovered

By Laura Geggel

An enigmatic group of Triassic reptiles might be a close relative of pterosaurs.

Lidar technology revealed long-abandoned villages that look like the rays of a sun.

Archaeologists find vast network of Amazon villages laid out like the cosmos

By Laura Geggel

The remnants of circular and rectangular villages dating to 1300 were discovered in the Amazon rainforest.

On Dec. 21, sky gazers looking just above the horizon will see Saturn and Jupiter appearing very close to one another.

Saturn and Jupiter to almost 'kiss' this winter solstice

By Laura Geggel

From Earth's perspective, Jupiter and Saturn will appear a moon's distance apart on Dec. 21.

The octopus's ninth arm is an offshoot on its left third arm.

Rare 9-armed octopus found off Japan coast

By Laura Geggel

How did an octopus in Japan grow nine arms?

This animation shows the sped-up orbit of 2020 SO, which was captured by Earth's gravity on Nov. 8, 2020. The space oddity will escape in March 2021.

Mysterious minimoon circling Earth is actually a 1960s rocket booster

By Laura Geggel

It's official: Earth's minimoon is human made.

A drone caught the exact moment Arecibo Observatory's platform broke.

Drone catches Arecibo Observatory's last moments

By Laura Geggel

When the cables broke at Arecibo Observatory, a drone caught the whole event on video.

Jungfrau summit in the Alps

The Alps are growing taller

By Laura Geggel

The Central Alps are growing "surprisingly quickly."

Thousands of images drawn during the last ice age were found in the Amazon Rainforest.

Sprawling 8-mile-long 'canvas' of ice age beasts discovered hidden in Amazon rainforest

By Laura Geggel

Ancient rock art of extinct ice age animals, handprints and patterns were found in the Amazon rainforest of Colombia.