Latest Recent single origin hypothesis Stories
April Flowers for redOrbit.com - Your Universe Online New analytical techniques are changing long-held, simplistic views about the evolutionary history of humans in Europe. The study, reported in the journal Trends in Genetics, found that many cultural, climatic, and demographic events have shaped genetic variation among modern-day European populations and that the variety of those mechanisms is more diverse than previously thought. Recent advances in paleogenetics, or the study of...
April Flowers for redOrbit.com - Your Universe Online A new study from the University of Cambridge finds that the DNA similarities between Neanderthals and modern humans are more likely to have arisen from a shared common ancestor than from interbreeding. Previously, it has been suggested that the shared parts of the genome sequence between the two populations was the result of interbreeding, but the new research, published this week in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of...
April Flowers for redOrbit.com - Your Universe Online An international team of scientists has reconstructed the dietary preferences of 3 groups of hominins found in South Africa. The paper, “Evidence for diet but not landscape use in South African early hominins," is a joint effort between the Ecole Normale Supérieure, the Université de Toulouse Paul Sabatier, and the University of the Witwatersrand and has been selected for Advanced Online Publication in the journal Nature. The...
The trade in ivory was largely outlawed in 1989, but poaching continues and remains a serious threat to the African elephant. Seizures of large amounts of ivory, sometimes over a ton, continue to occur. Research by Alfred Roca, an assistant professor at the university, could be the basis for the development of new law enforcement tools. Roca has found a way to determine where the ivory comes from. With funding from the Division of International Conservation of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife...
April Flowers for redOrbit.com - Your Universe Online Two recent articles in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences show that the Later Stone Age (LSA) and Modern Culture both emerged much earlier than was previously thought. A team of international scientists from South Africa, France, Italy, Norway, the USA and Britain dated and directly analyzed organic objects found in the archaeological layers at Border Cave, South Africa in the Lebombo Mountains near the border of...
Brett Smith for redOrbit.com - Your Universe Online A recent genetics study has shown evidence that another branch of the human evolutionary tree may have existed alongside Neanderthals, fueling the ongoing feud between paleontologists and geneticists. According to the study published this week in the journal Cell, a team of geneticists led by Joseph Lachance and Sarah A. Tishkoff of the University of Pennsylvania found DNA evidence of an interbreeding with an unknown archaic species of...
By using a new cutting-edge dating technique, researchers have discovered that the practice of painting cave art started as early as 40,000 years ago, or 10,000 years earlier than previously believed. A team of British, Spanish and Portuguese researchers, led by Dr. Alistair Pike of the University of Bristol, investigated some 50 paintings in 11 different caves in northern Spain. Since the paintings had no organic pigment, they could not use radiocarbon dating to determine their age, so...
According to a new paper published in the latest edition of the Journal of Human Evolution, researchers from Germany and the UK claim that they have identified the oldest known musical instruments on Earth. The research, conducted by experts from Oxford University and Tuebingen University, used carbon dating to discover that flutes crafted from the bones of birds and ivory from mammoth tusks were from between 42,000 and 43,000 years old, BBC News reported on Friday. The flutes, which...
(Ivanhoe Newswire)— The human brain is the center of the human nervous system and has the same general structure as the brains of other mammals, but it’s than expected. According to a pair of studies, a partial, duplicate copy of a gene appears to be responsible for the critical features of the human brain that distinguish us from our closest primate kin. The momentous gene duplication event occurred about two or three million years ago, at a critical transition in the evolution of the...
Analysis of ancient mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) has been used to establish migration and population patterns for American indigenous cultures during the time before Christopher Columbus sailed to the Americas. New research published in BioMed Central's open access journal BMC Genetics has used more detailed DNA analysis of individuals from Arequipa region to identify the family relationships and burial traditions of ancient Peru. The social unit (ayllu) of Native South Americans is thought...
