MachineMachine /stream - tagged with neanderthal http://machinemachine.net/stream/feed en-us http://blogs.law.harvard.edu/tech/rss Sweetcron therourke@gmail.com Neanderthals Getting a Colourful Upgrade http://www.huffingtonpost.com/kyle-jarrard/neanderthals-getting-an-c_b_1529513.html A chorus of smart, modern minds is rising over the hills of anthropology that the ancient Neanderthals of Europe weren't anywhere nearly as dumb, insufferable and unrecognizable as everyone thought all these years. At long last, these creatures who roamed the Continent for hundreds of thousands of years only to become extinct 30,000 years ago under the onslaught of modern humans from Africa are getting a major upgrade by the scientific community. No more can we say that old Neanderthal -- prototype of shaggy man with absolutely zero smarts -- didn't know what he was doing. And no more can… ]]> Wed, 23 May 2012 09:44:15 -0700 http://www.huffingtonpost.com/kyle-jarrard/neanderthals-getting-an-c_b_1529513.html Should we clone Neanderthals? http://www.nextnature.net/2011/02/should-we-clone-neanderthals//nextnaturenet-exploring-the-nature-caused-by-people Next What? « http://t.co/OgnSQIf0 - Technology is never a neutral tool. It is rather a socio-cultural dimension,... http://t.co/nZ73f2eu – quin aaron shakra (jadecricket) http://twitter.com/jadecricket/status/187368761806958592 ]]> Wed, 04 Apr 2012 01:42:58 -0700 http://www.nextnature.net/2011/02/should-we-clone-neanderthals//nextnaturenet-exploring-the-nature-caused-by-people What Happened Between the Neanderthals and Us? http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2011/08/15/110815fa_fact_kolbert?currentPage=all The question of what defines the human has, of course, been kicking around since Socrates, and probably a lot longer. If it has yet to be satisfactorily resolved, then this, Pääbo suspects, is because it has never been properly framed. “The challenge is to address the questions that are answerable,” he told me. Pääbo’s most ambitious project to date, which he has assembled an international consortium to assist him with, is an attempt to sequence the entire genome of the Neanderthal. The project is about halfway complete and has already yielded some unsettling results, including the news, announced by Pääbo… ]]> Wed, 07 Mar 2012 15:56:05 -0700 http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2011/08/15/110815fa_fact_kolbert?currentPage=all How We Won the Hominid Wars, and All the Others Died Out http://m.discovermagazine.com/2011/evolution/23-how-we-won-the-hominid-wars/how-we-won-the-hominid-wars-and-all-the-others-died-out-human-evolution-discover-magazine RT @HumanOrigins: How We Won The Hominid Wars and All the Others Died Out : http://t.co/yMFzhqTF #Neanderthals #x ]]> Sat, 25 Feb 2012 10:35:33 -0700 http://m.discovermagazine.com/2011/evolution/23-how-we-won-the-hominid-wars/how-we-won-the-hominid-wars-and-all-the-others-died-out-human-evolution-discover-magazine The Hobbit who helped us find our origins http://www.telegraph.co.uk/science/evolution/9094411/The-Hobbit-who-helped-us-find-our-origins.html/the-hobbit-who-helped-us-find-our-origins-telegraph The Hobbit who helped us find our origins http://t.co/1KIDllGa ]]> Tue, 21 Feb 2012 02:20:14 -0700 http://www.telegraph.co.uk/science/evolution/9094411/The-Hobbit-who-helped-us-find-our-origins.html/the-hobbit-who-helped-us-find-our-origins-telegraph Neanderthal Neuroscience http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/loom/2011/11/14/neanderthal-neuroscience/ As scientists began to build a database of human DNA in the 1990s, it became possible to test these ideas with genes. In his talk, Paabo described how he and his colleagues managed to extract some fragments of DNA from a Neanderthal fossil–by coincidence, the very first Neanderthal discovered in 1857. The DNA was of a special sort. Along with the bulk of our genes, which are located in the nucleus of our cells, we also carry bits of DNA in jellybean-shaped structures called mitochondria. Since there are hundreds of mitochondria in each cell, it’s easier to grab fragments of… ]]> Mon, 21 Nov 2011 03:09:18 -0700 http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/loom/2011/11/14/neanderthal-neuroscience/ Ancient DNA reveals secrets of human history http://www.nature.com/news/2011/110809/full/476136a.html By comparing individual DNA letters in multiple modern human genomes with those in the Neanderthal genome, the date of that interbreeding has now been pinned down to 65,000–90,000 years ago. Montgomery Slatkin and Anna-Sapfo Malaspinas, theoretical geneticists from the University of California, Berkeley, presented the finding at the Society for Molecular Biology and Evolution meeting in Kyoto, Japan, held on 26–30 July.
Slatkin says that their result agrees with another study presented at the meeting that came from the group of David Reich, a geneticist at Harvard Medical School in Boston, Massachusetts, who was involved in sequencing both the… ]]> Mon, 15 Aug 2011 02:45:39 -0700 http://www.nature.com/news/2011/110809/full/476136a.html The Origin of Our Species http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2011/jun/15/chris-stringer-origin-our-species-review "If there has been no spiritual change of kind / Within our species since Cro-Magnon Man . . ." The poet Louis MacNeice was voicing a commonplace that was accepted by most experts on human evolution until very recently – in fact still is by some. The evolutionary biologist Stephen Jay Gould put it like this: "There's been no biological change in humans in 40,000 or 50,000 years. Everything we call culture and civilisation we've built with the same body and brain."

The Cro-Magnons were the creators of the cave paintings at Lascaux and Altamira – the… ]]> Thu, 16 Jun 2011 16:18:36 -0700 http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2011/jun/15/chris-stringer-origin-our-species-review Neandertal hybridization & Haldane’s rule http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/gnxp/2011/04/neandertal-hybridization-haldanes-rule/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+GeneExpressionBlog+%28Gene+Expression%29 Mr. James Winters at A Replicated Typo pointed me to a short hypothesis paper, Neanderthal-human Hybrids. This paper argues that selective mating of Neandertal males with females of human populations which had left Africa more recently, combined with Haldane’s rule, explains three facts:
- The lack of Neandertal Y chromosomal lineages in modern humans.
- The lack of Neandertal mtDNA lineages in modern humans.
- The probable existence of Neandertal autosomal ancestry in modern humans.
If you don’t know, Haldane’s rule basically suggests that there’s going to be some sort of breakdown in the heterogametic sex. In humans… ]]> Thu, 28 Apr 2011 03:15:41 -0700 http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/gnxp/2011/04/neandertal-hybridization-haldanes-rule/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+GeneExpressionBlog+%28Gene+Expression%29 The Neanderthal Romeo and Human Juliet hypothesis http://blogs.plos.org/neuroanthropology/2010/10/26/the-neanderthal-romeo-and-human-juliet-hypothesis/ Just this year, researchers have estimated that gene flow from Neanderthals to humans occurred between 80,000 and 50,000 years ago (ScienceDaily May, 2010). Researchers have long wondered if Neanderthals were an entirely separate species, and recent evidence suggests that they probably weren’t. (Actually, one of the problems teaching human evolution is that we use a Linnaean system of classification with a Buffonian definition of species—two incompatible systems). However, even if Neanderthals were a separate species, speciation without any loss of hybrid fertility is possible.

Take the example given to me by Professor Roger Valentine Short: the Camelidae… ]]> Thu, 28 Oct 2010 03:49:00 -0700 http://blogs.plos.org/neuroanthropology/2010/10/26/the-neanderthal-romeo-and-human-juliet-hypothesis/ Finding the Neanderthal within ourselves http://www.boingboing.net/2010/10/22/finding-the-neandert.html Like a disowned half-brother the Neanderthals keep hammering on our door, forcing us to face inconvenient truths.

In the nineteenth century, fossil remains of powerful, thickset, short-necked human-like creatures with massive skulls and protruding brow ridges were found in Europe and recognized as belonging to an extinct species very closely related to us.

It turns out these "Neanderthals" (named after the German valley where the first examples were excavated) left the human homeland in Africa about 300,000 years ago. They migrated north into Europe and had sole possession of our continent for 250,000 years… ]]> Fri, 22 Oct 2010 09:12:00 -0700 http://www.boingboing.net/2010/10/22/finding-the-neandert.html Our Neandertal Brethren http://www.michaelshermer.com/2010/08/our-neandertal-brethren/ According to the late Harvard University biologist Ernst W. Mayr, the greatest evolutionary theorist since Charles Darwin, “species are groups of actually or potentially interbreeding natural populations which are reproductively isolated from other such groups.”

Reproductive isolation is the key to understanding how new species form, and many types of barriers can divide a population and split it into two different groups: geographic (such as a mountain range, desert, ocean or river), morphological (a change in coloration, body type or reproductive organs), behavioral (a change in breeding season, mating calls or courtship actions), and others. After isolation,… ]]> Fri, 13 Aug 2010 04:27:00 -0700 http://www.michaelshermer.com/2010/08/our-neandertal-brethren/ To crush a Morlock’s skull http://machinemachine.net/text/ideas/to-crush-a-morlock%E2%80%99s-skull

Although the Time Traveller is an inquisitive type his journey through the ancient museum offers him little insight. The relics are from his future: the arché has all but snapped off from archeology. As he leaves the museum the Time Traveller ponders how best to crush a Morlock’s skull.

The Neanderthal is the most futuristic thing I can think of. Riddled with mythic charm, and soon to have its genes… ]]> Mon, 28 Jun 2010 10:42:00 -0700 http://machinemachine.net/text/ideas/to-crush-a-morlock%E2%80%99s-skull European and Asian genomes have traces of Neanderthal http://www.nature.com/news/2010/100506/full/news.2010.225.html The genomes of most modern humans are 1–4% Neanderthal — a result of interbreeding with the close relatives that went extinct 30,000 years ago, according to work by an international group of researchers.

The team, led by Svante Pääbo, a geneticist at the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology in Leipzig, is reporting only 60% of the Neanderthal genome. But sequencing even this much of the genome was thought to be impossible just a decade ago.

"This will change our view of humanity," says John Hardy, a neuroscientist at University College London who was… ]]> Sun, 09 May 2010 06:53:00 -0700 http://www.nature.com/news/2010/100506/full/news.2010.225.html Neanderthals may have interbred with humans http://www.nature.com/news/2010/100420/full/news.2010.194.html?s=news_rss&utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+news%2Frss%2Fmost_recent+%28NatureNews+-+Most+recent+articles%29 Archaic humans such as Neanderthals may be gone but they're not forgotten — at least not in the human genome. A genetic analysis of nearly 2,000 people from around the world indicates that such extinct species interbred with the ancestors of modern humans twice, leaving their genes within the DNA of people today. The discovery, presented at the annual meeting of the American Association of Physical Anthropologists in Albuquerque, New Mexico, on 17 April, adds important new details to the evolutionary history of the human species. And it may help explain the fate of the Neanderthals, who vanished from the… ]]> Wed, 21 Apr 2010 01:50:00 -0700 http://www.nature.com/news/2010/100420/full/news.2010.194.html?s=news_rss&utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+news%2Frss%2Fmost_recent+%28NatureNews+-+Most+recent+articles%29 No Bones about It: Ancient DNA from Siberia Hints at Previously Unknown Human Relative http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=new-hominin-species For much of the past five million to seven million years over which humans have been evolving, multiple species of our forebears co-existed. But eventually the other lineages went extinct, leaving only our own, Homo sapiens, to rule Earth. Scientists long thought that by 40,000 years ago H. sapiens shared the planet with only one other human species, or hominin: the Neandertals. In recent years, however, evidence of a more happening hominin scene at that time has emerged. Indications that H. erectus might have persisted on the Indonesian island of Java until 25,000 years ago have surfaced. And then there's… ]]> Fri, 26 Mar 2010 06:07:00 -0700 http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=new-hominin-species Raising Neanderthals: Metaphysics at the Limits of Science http://www.3quarksdaily.com/3quarksdaily/2010/03/raising-neanderthals-metaphysics-at-the-limits-of-science.html

A face to face encounter, devoid of the warm appeal of flesh. The eyes are glass, a cold blue crystal reflects the light in a way real eyes never would. A muzzle of hair, perhaps taken from a barbershop floor or the hind quarters of an animal. The painted scalp peeks through the sparse strands: there is nothing here one might caress with fumbling fingers, or, a millennia ago, pick between to lovingly tease out a louse or mite. The figure balances uneasily on stumps for legs. Its waxen surface bears no resemblance to skin. It is a shade saturated…

]]> Sun, 21 Mar 2010 22:30:00 -0700 http://www.3quarksdaily.com/3quarksdaily/2010/03/raising-neanderthals-metaphysics-at-the-limits-of-science.html Raising Neanderthals http://machinemachine.net/text/ideas/raising-neanderthals

In northern Spain 49,000 years ago, 11 Neanderthals were murdered. Their tooth enamel shows that each of them had gone through several periods of severe starvation, a condition their assailants probably shared. Cut marks on the bones indicate the people were butchered with stone tools. About 700 feet inside El Sidrön cave, a research team including Lalueza-Fox excavated 1,700 bones from that cannibalistic feast. Much of what is known about Neanderthal genetics comes from those 11 individuals.

Lalueza-Fox does not plan to sequence the entire genome of the El Sidrön Neanderthals. He is interested in specific genes. “I choose genes… ]]> Thu, 11 Mar 2010 09:35:00 -0700 http://machinemachine.net/text/ideas/raising-neanderthals Should We Clone Neanderthals? http://www.archaeology.org/1003/etc/neanderthals.html If Neanderthals ever walk the earth again, the primordial ooze from which they will rise is an emulsion of oil, water, and DNA capture beads engineered in the laboratory of 454 Life Sciences in Branford, Connecticut. Over the past 4 years those beads have been gathering tiny fragments of DNA from samples of dissolved organic materials, including pieces of Neanderthal bone. Genetic sequences have given paleoanthropologists a new line of evidence for testing ideas about the biology of our closest extinct relative. The first studies of Neanderthal DNA focused on the genetic sequences of mitochondria, the microscopic organelles that convert… ]]> Mon, 01 Mar 2010 04:58:00 -0700 http://www.archaeology.org/1003/etc/neanderthals.html