Help this little boy find his parents: Sorry. I couldn't find any pictures from Encino Man.
Courtesy coteIt’s a weird suggestion, I know, because you probably give a lot of thought to whom the various cavemen had sex with anyway, regardless of the weather. But give it a little extra thought today. Because it’s nice out, and the dark corners of your brain could use the sunlight.

So, you guys all know that we aren’t the only human species ever to exist, right? The human family tree had other branches before it got to us (take a look at our Human Spark feature for more on that), and there were times when more than one species lived in the same area, and—in all probability—had interactions with each other. Neanderthals, for instance, lived alongside modern humans for many thousands of years in ice age Europe. Keep in mind, “Neanderthal” isn’t just a synonym for “cave-man.” Neanderthals were a distinct species—they had heavier, longer skulls, and thick, strong bodies. The modern humans of ice age Europe would have looked, more or less, like us. And because the two species were living in the same area for so long, it seems pretty likely that they interacted. But did those interactions include, you know, dinner, dancing, and romantic music?

Svante Paabo of the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology in Germany says yes, for sure they were having sex.

On one hand, these are sort of fightin’ words. People have suggested that Neanderthals faded into extinction as they interbred with modern humans, but when human DNA was compared with a sequence of Neanderthal DNA, it didn’t look like there was any overlap. That is, if there was any interbreeding, the Neanderthal contributions to our genes have been so diluted with human genes that it doesn’t appear that we have any Neanderthals in our family at all.

On the other hand… Well… I mean… People do all sorts of stuff… We all just want someone to love, right? Or, you know, just think of what a puppy will do to a piece of furniture. And humans and Neanderthals are a lot more similar to each other than puppies and ottomans. Too much? I don’t think so. Look at ligers. Or tigons. Or mules. Similar animals interbreed all the time, but very often they have infertile offspring. And that would explain why we don’t see any Neanderthal genes around today—everybody could have been doing it like it was 2012, but if the offspring couldn’t reproduce it wouldn’t matter to future generations.

Another factor that could explain the lack of genetic overlap (despite Paabo’s certainty of caveman/Neanderthal sexiness) is that our Neanderthal DNA sample just isn’t good enough. Mitochondrial DNA from Neanderthals doesn’t show up in modern humans, and while that’s an incredibly valuable genetic marker, it only makes up a tiny fraction of an organism’s total DNA. The Neanderthal genome hasn’t been completely sequenced yet, and that’s what Paabo means to do. Once we can fully compare the genomes, we can see if the two species became at all mixed.

Because they were definitely doing it.

Tags : sex, Neanderthals, human spark, human evolution

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Neanderthal skulls: They're speaking to each other, but we can't understand. Or we don't want to.
Courtesy letedImagine how a Neanderthal would have sounded. Do it.

Maybe something along the lines of Darth Gorilla? That was my thought. Anyway, hold that sound in your head… and forget it. Here, for the first time in 30,000 years, you can hear a single syllable of Neanderthal speech. Click here, and listen to a voice from the depths of time…

Um, what? Let’s try that again. The ghosts of the distant past whisper their secrets to us…

I see… Well that was a little… underwhelming. Underwhelming and vaguely familiar… What could it possibly be that I’m thinking of? What could I have heard in my short life that might sound anything like a might Neanderthal? What indeed?

Well, like it or not, that mind-blowing audio simulation is the product of a recent study by an anthropologist at Florida Atlantic University in Boca Raton. Based on skeletal remains, Dr. Robert McCarthy has reconstructed Neanderthal vocal tracts to simulate what their voices might have sounded like.

While it’s likely that Neanderthals could speak (there’s some evidence that they used pigments to decorate themselves, which suggests at least basic communication), McCarthy says they would have sounded a “bit different,” and would have been unable to produce “quantal vowels.”

Quantal vowels are the basis for much of human speech, and allow, for example, us to distinguish a word like “beat” from a similar word, like “bit.” So here’s the same type of simulation with a human voice producing an “E” sound.

And, once again, here’s the stentorian bellow of the Neanderthal, attempting to produce the same sound. The Neanderthals must have lived in a confusing world, with fate being put in their shoes, and sandwiches full of mate.

Even though people would probably have a difficult time understanding each other without the use of quantal vowels, many anthropologists believe that the anatomy of the throat and mouth is less important for language than the “neuronal control over it.” Even if Neanderthals were physically unable to speak quite like modern humans, that doesn’t necessarily imply that they were less effective communicators. In fact, Neanderthals have been shown to share the gene “FOXP2” with humans—something other primates don’t possess. When a person is missing a copy of FOXP2, they suffer from language and speech disorders, leading some to believe that its presence in Neanderthals is an indicator of the capacity for speech.

Clearly.

Tags : Neanderthals, speech, computer simulation, frightening

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Oh my God! She's doing it right now!: Each to their own, but...
Courtesy wallygAccording to a new paper in the journal Medical Hypotheses, cannibalism and its associated neurodegenerative diseases may have contributed to the extinction of Neanderthals 30,000 years ago.

The cause of the Neanderthals’ extinction has long been something of a mystery to science. Even the rate at which they disappeared is unclear—some scientists believe that their extinction as a species was gradual, and due to an inability to adapt to changing environmental conditions, or because of interbreeding with Cro-Magnon people over an extended period of time. Others believe that the extinction was relatively rapid, and could have been caused by direct, violent confrontation (or at least competition) with the Cro-Magnon, or by a strong susceptibility to certain diseases.

The new cannibalism theory fits in with this last idea to some extent. Combining fossil evidence of Neanderthal cannibalism with ethnological data on the Fore people of Papua New Guinea, the author of the new paper thinks it’s likely that some form of Transmissible Spongiform Encephalopathy (or TSE, brain mushing diseases like Mad Cow Disease) could have greatly reduced the Neanderthal population and contributed to their ultimate extinction.

The Fore people were known to have practiced cannibalism to some extent for some time, but beginning around 1900 anthropologists began to observe a neurodegenerative condition called “Kuru” taking hold among the Fore. By the 1960’s, Kuru had reached “epidemic levels” and killed over 1,100 people. Eventually it was discerned that Kuru was a type of TSE, contracted by eating the brains or nervous tissue of other infected individuals, or even by using reusing the tools employed for this type of butchery (even mdern sterilization techniques don’t always remove the prions that cause TSE’s from surgical implements.)

Some fossil evidence in France seems to suggest that Neanderthals, on occasion at least, consumed the flesh of others of their species, including their brains. If cannibalism were prevalent among Neanderthals and a TSE was introduced into the food chain, as it were, the effects could have been devastating on the population.

Which brings me back to my titular point: the major hole in this theory is that no one in their right mind (although TSE’s probably redefine “right mind”) would want to eat a Neanderthal, even other Neanderthals. I mean, they look so… lumpy. Yuck. Of all the primates, extant and otherwise, Neanderthals are probably the least appetizing to me. Would I eat an orangutan? I certainly would. Java Man? In a heartbeat. And, really, the only thing keeping me from eating bonobos is geography. But a Neanderthal? Bleh. Their brains probably taste like wet towels and fish aspic.

I suppose the author of the paper has a response to this not covered in the article I saw (paprika, maybe?), but, as far as I’m concerned, a recipe can only take you so far. Next theory, please.

Tags : spongiform encephalopathy, health, infectious disease, Neanderthals, mad-cow disease, cannibalism, TSE

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Better red than dead?: Image courtesy Mark RyanResearchers in Spain have determined through DNA analysis that some Neanderthals were redheaded. The flaming locks it seems are the result of a change in a specific gene called MC1R. In modern humans, mutations in the same gene result in red hair.

"We found a variant of MC1R in Neanderthals which is not present in modern humans, but which causes an effect on the hair similar to that seen in modern redheads," said Carles Lalueza-Fox, an assistant professor in genetics at the University of Barcelona. He’s also the lead author of the study that appeared in the journal Science.

Neanderthals were a stocky human species that is thought to have died out about 24,000 years ago. They ranged across much of Europe, Siberia to the east, and as far south as Israel. The variation in the Neanderthal MC1R gene is different from that found in modern humans (Homo sapiens) and seems to indicate that inter-breeding between the two species maybe didn’t happen as some scientists think.

The origins of Homo sapiens have been traced back to Africa, where darker skin and hair is prevalent as a protection against the UV rays of the tropical sun. But when Homo sapiens migrated northward into the diminished sunlight regions some 40,000 years ago, that selective pressure soon faded away - so to speak- and subsequently so did the hair and skin tones.

"It suggests there may be a propensity towards the reduction of melanin in populations away from the tropics,” said Dr. Clive Finlayson, director of Spain’s Gibraltar Museum. “If the Neanderthal and modern variants are different, it may be a good example of parallel, or convergent evolution - a similar evolutionary response to the same situation.”

Fair-skinned people may have an evolutionary advantage in temperate regions because they generate more vitamin D.

Well, that’s all well and good, but this whole Neanderthal-red hair connection is hardly news to me since a lot of my in-laws are redheads. My wife’s father was a redhead, as are four of her siblings, and each generation that followed seemed to pass on the gene, so now there are dozens and dozens of carrot-topped descendents running amok at family reunions. I suppose this new research does validate what I’ve been saying for years, but…

Maybe I better just shut up.

LINKS

BBC story
Science journal story

Tags : DNA, Neanderthals, human genome, cave people, Homo sapiens

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Skull of Homo neanderthalensis: Photo courtesy Wikimedia Commons.A new study in the cause of Neanderthal man’s (Homo neanderthalensis) extinction counters a previous study that linked the demise to sudden changes in the southern Europe’s climate.

The new report, by a paleoanthropologist from Germany’s Max Planck Institute of Evolutionary Biology, claims that there is no discernible connection of the extinction of our closest evolutionary relatives to extreme climate change.

Published recently in the journal Nature, the new research is centered on the comparing of evidence gathered from deep-sea core drillings in Venezuela, and from sediments found at Gorham’s Cave, in southern Gibraltar, thought to be one of the last places inhabited by Neanderthals on the European continent.

Using radiocarbon dates of 32,000, 28,000 and 24,000 (which are thought to mark the demise of our stocky prehistoric cousins), professor Katerina Harvati and her team compared them to past climate data gathered from the deep-sea drilling cores.

"The more controversial date of circa 24,000 years ago, places the last Neanderthals just before a major climate shift that would have been characterized by a large expansion of ice sheets and the onset of cold conditions in northern Europe,” according to Harvati, who co- authored the paper.

"But Gibraltar's climate would have remained relatively unaffected, perhaps as a result of warm water from the sub-tropical Atlantic entering the western Mediterranean,” she said

Converting a radiocarbon date into a calendar year can be tricky, but the team came up with a method to correlate estimated dates of the species’ demise with records of past climate. The first two dates, 32,000 and 28,000 didn’t correlate with any extreme climatic changes. And the earlier date, 24,000, corresponded to a paleoclimate occurring before the onset of colder, more severe weather in northern Europe, and ice-sheet advancement.

But even then the authors say that the onset was hardly a sudden ice-age, but rather the beginning of a 1000-year gradual change in climate.

So if a sudden shift in climate didn’t kill off the Neanderthals, what did? The question remains open.

"This eliminates catastrophic climate change as a cause for extinction, but this leaves a whole range of other possibilities,” Harvati said.

LINKS

BBC website story
History of Gorham’s Cave
Early Modern Homo sapiens

Tags : archaeology, Ice Age, Paleoanthropology, climate change, Neanderthals

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Neanderthalensis-Sapiens love child?: DNA sequencing may provide the answer. Photo courtesy of Mark Ryan's mother

Did Neanderthals, the stocky, muscular human relatives that dominated Europe until 30,000 years ago, have the ability to communicate through language? And if so, did any of their chat sessions ever lead to dating and possibly mating with us, their not-so-distant cousins?

DNA extracted from the thigh bone of a caveman who lived 38,000 years ago in Croatia may supply scientists with the answers to these and other questions.

Two studies, one in Germany, the other in California, have reported new and exciting techniques for compiling the entire genome for Neanderthals, modern humans closest and most recent evolutionary link. Their research results, reported in the journals Nature and Science, respectively, convey they have demonstrated independently that it is now possible to recover the Neanderthal genome. Just a few years ago, the idea of doing this kind of sequencing was considered hopeless.

Dr. Svante Paabo who led one project at the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology in Leipzig, Germany said that one million units of the estimated 3.2 billion units of Neanderthal DNA have already been mapped.

What has made this possible is a new DNA sequencing machine developed by a Branford, Connecticut company called 454 Life Sciences. The new sampler uses firefly light to sort through and catalogue vast amounts of fragmented DNA.

Dr. Paabo also shared some of his precious sample of Neanderthal DNA with Edward M. Rubin of the Joint Genome Institute in Walnut Creek, California. Using a different method, Rubin’s team identified 62,250 units of Neanderthal DNA.

Richard G. Klein, a Stanford University paleoanthropologist not involved in the studies, found the results “monumental.” He added that the full Neanderthal genome would resolve many longstanding questions about Neanderthals and their connection to modern humans, including physical and behavioral differences.

Of particular interest is whether Neanderthals could speak and had developed a language. The FOXP2 gene is thought to be one of the last evolving components leading to language development and has shown significant change since human-chimpanzee split occurred about six million years ago. If the Neanderthal genome is fully retrieved, and the FOXP2 gene more resembles the chimp version, then the thinking is that language development is less likely.

Dr. Paabo’s team has estimated the establishing Neanderthal population size to be about 3,000 individuals, while Dr. Rubin’s team reports that human and Neanderthal genomes are at least 99.5 percent identical. However, both research teams think it unlikely the two species interbred but the idea cannot be completely ruled out.

The extraction of readable DNA poses problems for scientists. The samples are often contaminated by bacterial DNA that attacked the remains when they were fresh or other human DNA left from curators or scientists handling the specimens.

On top of that, DNA begins to quickly degrade into short fragments after death making it tricky to locate a sample that has somehow survived. Dr. Paabo searched through museum collections all across Europe before finally finding one that satisfied his stringent criteria. It was a small bone from a cave in Croatia that had languished in a box of insignificant and relatively little-handled fossils. Only about 6 percent of the DNA present was Neanderthal, but with the new sequencing machine it should be more than enough to retrieve the specie’s gene sequence.

With 1 million units of Neanderthal DNA already mapped, Dr. Paabo estimates the rest should be completed in about two years.

SOURCES and MORE INFO:

BBC
454 Life Sciences Neanderthal info
Genome Research
Human Genome Project

Tags : human origins, DNA, DNA sequencing, Neanderthals

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Photo courtesy of Mark Ryan

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