Aurelia Posted May 6, 2010 Report Share Posted May 6, 2010 Many people alive today possess some Neanderthal ancestry, according to a landmark scientific study. The finding has surprised many experts, as previous genetic evidence suggested the Neanderthals made little or no contribution to our inheritance. The result comes from analysis of the Neanderthal genome - the "instruction manual" describing how these ancient humans were put together. The genomes of 1% to 4% of people in Eurasia come from Neanderthals. More on BBC News Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
caldrail Posted May 7, 2010 Report Share Posted May 7, 2010 (edited) It is an interesting subject. I saw one report on the news bulletins recently in which one expert suggested that because of all the foreign genes introduced to British society, at some point the British will have a 'coffee' coloured skin. Now whilst that might be true due to averaging, I doubt that would happen. I would expect the skin tone to migrate toward white - not because of any racial issue, but simply because the British live in a northerly climate and have already migrated to a general pale skin despite in the influx of african genes since the Roman Empire, due to biological adaption to the enviroment. the possibility of neanderthal survival in our gene pool has been debated before. One study came to the conclusion that the last few neanderthals in Portugal sought shelter with Cro-Magnon tribes and eventually interbreeded (such a cold description isn't it!). Others have refuted it. But if the genes are present - I would have to say that's a few wisps of smoke left in the barrel. Edited May 7, 2010 by caldrail Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
M. Porcius Cato Posted May 7, 2010 Report Share Posted May 7, 2010 What's weird is that there is still no evidence of any of our genes surviving in the Neanderthal genome. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Aurelia Posted May 7, 2010 Author Report Share Posted May 7, 2010 What's weird is that there is still no evidence of any of our genes surviving in the Neanderthal genome. That's probably because the Neanderthal genome sequencing is still incomplete. Here's another interesting article on the subject. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Maty Posted May 9, 2010 Report Share Posted May 9, 2010 Europeans can have other than the black hair and brown eyes which are the norm for other races. Hmmm... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bryaxis Hecatee Posted May 10, 2010 Report Share Posted May 10, 2010 One possibility for the absence of our genome in Neandertal's DNA might be that interbreeding worked one way only, either by DNA incompatibility or because Cro Magnon women could not bear the larger half Neanderthal babies and died in childbirth. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
M. Porcius Cato Posted May 12, 2010 Report Share Posted May 12, 2010 One possibility for the absence of our genome in Neandertal's DNA might be that interbreeding worked one way only, either by DNA incompatibility or because Cro Magnon women could not bear the larger half Neanderthal babies and died in childbirth. I don't get the "DNA incompatibility" idea. Could you give another example of a known "DNA incompatibility" leading to a one-sided exchange of DNA? Also, even if all Cro-Magnon *women* were killed in childbirth bearing the offspring of Neanderthal fathers, that would still leave Neanderthal/Cro-Magnon babies with a chance to grow up and interbreed with either Neanderthals (thereby leaving a trace of Cro-Magnon DNA in Neanderthal DNA) or Cro-Magnons (thereby leaving a trace of Neanderthal DNA in Cro-Magnons). So why are we only finding Neanderthal DNA in us, but not our DNA in them? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kosmo Posted May 12, 2010 Report Share Posted May 12, 2010 Europeans can have other than the black hair and brown eyes which are the norm for other races. Hmmm... "As our ability to retrieve and sequence ancient DNA has developed and improved, we Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Viggen Posted June 4, 2010 Report Share Posted June 4, 2010 I would like to add this interesting news article from 2000 to show that nothing is set in stone in science http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/694467.stm Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
The Roadie Posted June 5, 2010 Report Share Posted June 5, 2010 I would like to add this interesting news article from 2000 to show that nothing is set in stone in science http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/694467.stm The sexual intercourse would have happened in Israel or the Two Rivers region about 60 000 years ago, and could actually just been one single encounter between a Neanderthal and a Cro Magnon. It was the first modern humans who exited Africa who came into contact with this Neanderthal, or these Neanderthals. While one intercourse seem to be very little for explaining the fact that all Eurasians have about 1-4% Neanderthal DNA, we should also remember that around 5% of the Eurasian population today are directly descended to a male who lived in Mongolia 800 years ago. In a hunter-gatherer society where most people still lived in one or just a few small communities around the Persian Gulf, the genes could probably travel with enough ease to properly "infect" most of the population of exodus Africans. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
diegis Posted June 13, 2010 Report Share Posted June 13, 2010 Well, its a very interesting debate, and it seem that the oldest "Homo Sapiens" remains found until now in Europe have some features who point in the direction that Homo Sapiens interbreeded with Neanderthal after all This is the article http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/3129654.stm Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Melvadius Posted June 13, 2010 Report Share Posted June 13, 2010 Well, its a very interesting debate, and it seem that the oldest "Homo Sapiens" remains found until now in Europe have some features who point in the direction that Homo Sapiens interbreeded with Neanderthal after all This is the article http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/3129654.stm This is an interesting article although I do wonder, as it is from 2003, whether the new dating methods currently being used by the Research Laboratory for Archaeology at Oxford University (and increasingly other laboratories) [developed by Oxford Radiocarbon Accelerator Unit] may be in the process of changing them. The lab is currently involved in a major programme of retesting previously accepted radio-carbon dates for the spread of modern humans across Europe, using an improved calibration method which gets rids of many of the uncertainties in previous dates. Problems with previous dates include the radiocarbon 'wiggle' due to variations in the rate at which radiocarbon is produced in the upper atmosphere, which can lead to three possible dates being suggested after testing. Other issues include 'contamination' when more modern or older carbon can be included in samples when they are tested which can adversely affect the accuracy of the dates. A recent survey of Lake Taupo in New Zealand, which has an active volcanic vent below its surface actively producing degernerated (older) carbon, found a live freshwater muscle that was apparently dated to 1998 BP plus or minus 43 years, while some of the water in the lake taken from near the vent had an apparent age of 4071 BP plus or minus 65 years. Oxford apparently hope to be publishing the results of their retesting of dates in the next few months so it may well be a case of watch this space to see exactly how old modern humans are in Europe and whether they did or did not have any opportunity to interact with Neandertals when they did. [Edit] Further details of this current research by Oxford Radiocarbon Accelerator Unit is available at Dating of the Middle-Upper Palaeolithic transition in western Europe using ultrafiltration AMS radiocarbon Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Viggen Posted June 24, 2010 Report Share Posted June 24, 2010 Separation between Neanderthal and Homo sapiens might have occurred 500,000 years earlier The separation of Neardenthal and Homo sapiens might have occurred at least one million years ago, more than 500.000 years earlier than previously believed after DNA-based analyses. A doctoral thesis conducted at the National Center for Research on Human Evolution (Centro Nacional de Investigaci Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DecimusCaesar Posted June 28, 2010 Report Share Posted June 28, 2010 On a somewhat unrelated point, this video from a BBC documentary has completely shattered some of my view pop culture misconceptions on the Neanderthals: An interesting video, hopefully the BBc will put up the whole documentary one day. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Aurelia Posted June 30, 2010 Author Report Share Posted June 30, 2010 On a somewhat unrelated point, this video from a BBC documentary has completely shattered some of my view pop culture misconceptions on the Neanderthals: An interesting video, hopefully the BBc will put up the whole documentary one day. Lol, that was a bit of a ridiculous demonstration. With a voice like that, I would not be surprised if a Neanderthal was laughed out of his cave by a Cro-Magnon. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Join the conversation
You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.
Note: Your post will require moderator approval before it will be visible.