How did the sabertooth cat wield its excess of tooth? Mark Kostich / iStock Of all the vicious smiles to have ever evolved, it’s hard to beat the grin of the aptly named Smilodon. The largest of these ...

On a superficial level, the predatory habits of the saber-toothed cat Smilodon would not seem to be especially mysterious. Traditionally – and incorrectly – restored as a lion with extra-long upper ...

This article was published in Scientific American’s former blog network and reflects the views of the author, not necessarily those of Scientific American Ice Age mammals loom large in our imagination ...

In public imagination, the sabre-toothed cat Smilodon ranks alongside Tyrannosaurus rex as the ultimate killing machine. Powerfully built, with upper canines like knives, Smilodon was a fearsome ...

A Smilodon fends off vultures at what would later be called the Rancho La Brea tar pits, situated in Los Angeles, California. Painting by Charles R. Knight. The feeding habits of saber-toothed cats ...

Researchers have tested the biting efficiency of Smilodon, an extinct species of carnivore close to the extant felines. Using high-precision 3D scans and simulation methods, the team has just revealed ...

The adolescent saber-toothed cat on a summertime hunt realized too late that she had made a terrible miscalculation. Already the size of a modern-day tiger, with huge canine teeth, she had crept ...

Aside from the woolly mammoth, no Pleistocene creature is more iconic than Smilodon. The vanished sabercat is a symbol of North America’s recently lost megafauna, but it’s also an Ice Age mystery.

Add Yahoo as a preferred source to see more of our stories on Google. This wasn’t always a mystery. If you had the misfortune of being a human being more than 10,000 years ago, there’s a decent chance ...