Neanderthal DNA

[Charlie Hatchett]

"This fossil is a major addition to the growing body of fossil, genetic and archaeological evidence indicating significant levels of biological and cultural interaction between modern humans and the anatomically archaic populations (including the Neanderthals) they met along the way as they spread from Africa into Eurasia," Zilhao said.

Nice article, Beag. My head is spinning from all the possible combinations.
No easy answers, ey? Throw H. erectus into the mix, and.... ...
my head's spinning again.

[Beagle]

Yeah, that story is all over the internet today. Here's another take on it.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070116/ap_ ... anderthals

Paabo and team may have some news this year about the Neandertal genome. In fact, this could be a very big year, with news from Topper and Hueyatlaco possibly forthcoming.

[Charlie Hatchett]

However, there were also features that are unusual in modern humans, such as frontal flattening, a fairly large bone behind the ear and exceptionally large upper molars, which are seen among Neanderthals and other early hominids.

It could reflect a case in which ancient traits reappear in a modern human, or it could indicate a mixture of populations, Zilhao said. Or it simply may be that science hasn't been able to study enough early modern people to understand their diversity.

Interesting angle.

None of the features cited as unusual in modern humans is exclusively Neanderthal, Potts said. Rather, they could be features passed down from earlier populations in Africa.

Another interesting angle.

In fact, this could be a very big year, with news from Topper and Hueyatlaco possibly forthcoming.

Yes sir! I'm looking forward to it. Maybe some big picture questions will be answered...or we'll be able to make more informed hypotheses.

Thanks, Beag.

[Cognito]

Here is an interesting theoretical paper that should really annoy those who aren't in touch with their Neanderthal genetics:

http://www.rdos.net/eng/asperger.htm

The author recently modified his material (14 January 2007) and has come up with some new, whacky ideas. A few nice pictures and graphs, though. The picture of the Neanderthal child at the beginning is a dead ringer for my neighbor's little annoying offspring brat. I always thought she was a flathead.

[Beagle]

Thanks Cogs. I've read this before but I didn't know it had been recently updated. I'll give it a good look later today.

[Digit]

Flathead? You've been reading Clan of the Cave Bear haven't you Cogs?
Interesting links though, haven't finished it yet but I was particularly interested in the part about hybrids and back breeding. Such a scenario would answer the likelyhood of interbreeding and the failure to find proof, as yet any way.

[Cognito]

Flathead? You've been reading Clan of the Cave Bear haven't you Cogs?

My wife gave me the Clan of the Cave Bear and I struggled through it. Jean Auel's further books were unreadable for me other than as a sleeping aid. From Wikipedia:

In 1986, the movie, The Clan of the Cave Bear was released. It starred Daryl Hannah and Joey Cramer and was a box-office flop having cost US$15 million to produce and only bringing in $1.9 million in the U.S. None of the other books have been adapted to film.

I had more fun watching the movie because I've always wanted to poke Daryl Hannah, but that's a topic for a different thread. Did you read that Daryl? When we hooking up?

[Digit]

The C of the CB was a struggle I grant you, the rest of the series I found much better. The film, the less about that the better I believe, DH not withstanding.

[Beagle]

http://www.spiegel.de/international/0%2 ... %2C00.html

Archaeologists have found the remains of a 120,000-year-old Stone Age hunting camp in an open-cast lignite mine near Inden in the German state of North Rhine-Westphalia.

"We'll never find such a camp ever again," archaeologist Jürgen Thissen from the Rhineland Commission for Historical Sites said in Bonn Monday. "There isn't another one in the whole of Germany."

This article does not use the word Neandertal, but they were the only people in Europe at this time.

[marduk]

The site is about 60 kilometres east of Belgium's Neanderthal campsites at Veldwezelt.

[Beagle]

http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?chanID ... 2CB470872C

NEW YORK (Reuters) - The traditional museum showpieces of human evolution, Lucy and Peking Man, are being nudged aside at the famed American Museum of Natural History by a newcomer that appears to be an empty test tube.

Curators say a display of microscopic 38,000-year-old Neanderthal DNA, which seems to be nothing but a vial in a glass case, marks a symbolic start to a new permanent exhibit which breaks with a tradition of relying on fossil research to educate.

From The News Section.

[Beagle]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/6341987.stm

A sharp freeze could have dealt the killer blow that finished off our evolutionary cousins the Neanderthals, according to a new study.
The ancient humans are thought to have died out in most parts of Europe by about 35,000 years ago.

And now new data from their last known refuge in southern Iberia indicates the final population was probably beaten by a cold spell some 24,000 years ago.

The Neandertal extinction theory de jour.

[marduk]

this gets worse and worse doesnt it
the most likely theory imo
that the second Homo Sapiens turned up they started interbreeding with the Neanderthals. How many guys here can't say they haven't slept with someone they wouldn't have if they'd seen them in good lighting first
back then there was no lighting at all
progeny of two different species are often sterile

so the first generation of halfbreeds would have been normal with attributes of both
and by the second generation Neanderthals would have been completely extinct
then newly arriving homo sapiens had no competition
and no more hairy wives
until the creation of france thousands of years later

[Cognito]

the most likely theory imo that the second Homo Sapiens turned up they started interbreeding with the Neanderthals ... progeny of two different species are often sterile

so the first generation of halfbreeds would have been normal with attributes of both and by the second generation Neanderthals would have been completely extinct then newly arriving homo sapiens had no competition and no more hairy wives until the creation of france thousands of years later

So, let me get this straight. Neanderthals survived the Toba extinction event only to be done in by a cold snap? I don't think so. It certainly is more believable that they were bred out of existence and, given the hundreds of following generations of H. sapiens genetic overlay, there would be little or no trace of them.

Marduk, you mentioned France but forgot Belgium ... obviously, you're slipping.

[Forum Monk]

At the risk of making someone mad -

and no more hairy wives
until the creation of france thousands of years later