Extinct humanoid species may have lived in PHL
GMA News Online – Fri, Aug 31, 2012
Scientists armed with new technology have successfully mapped the genes of an extinct humanoid species that may have lived in the Philippines tens of thousands of years ago.
The scientists have conducted a high-precision genetic sequencing of the extinct Denisovan people, a relative of humans, the journal Science reported. An earlier study of Denisovan DNA showed that the species interbred with —and passed on genes to— humans in Asia, including the Philippines. “Aboriginal Australians, Near Oceanians, Polynesians, Fijians, east Indonesians, and Mamanwa (a ‘Negrito’ group from the Philippines) have all inherited genetic material from Denisovans,” the study said.
Asians’ Denisovan heritage
According to an LA Times report, the study found “three to five percent of the DNA in people native to Papua New Guinea, Australia, the Philippines and other islands nearby came from Denisovans.”
However, the report said the authors of the study did not find any significant contribution of Denisovans to the DNA of people from mainland Eurasia.
Still, it quoted the scientists as saying that an analysis of the genome and comparisons with ours and that of neanderthals —another now-extinct humanoid species that lived alongside our ancestors— will offer insights into the history of Homo sapiens.
Tracing humanity’s past
The insights may include “who we mated with, where and when — as well as the unique genetic changes that make modern humans who they are,” the report quoted the scientists as saying.
But study leader Svante Paabo, a pioneer in decoding ancient genomes, said it may take biologists decades to understand the meaning of all these tiny differences.
“Many of them may have no function — but among them will undoubtedly hide some crucial changes that are essential for what made modern human history possible,” said Paabo, director of the department of evolutionary genetics at the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology in Leipzig, Germany.
The Denisovan genome
The Denisovan genome was derived from tiny quantities of shredded DNA extracted from a finger bone found in a Russian cave in 2008 and a tooth found later.
Also, the analysis suggests the Denisovans had dark skin, brown hair and brown eyes, but scientists cannot say much more beyond that for now.
But scientists said what is striking is that the genome is as detailed as a sequence generated with a fresh blood or saliva sample from someone alive today.
The scientists banked on new techniques to investigate scant and highly degraded genetic material found in fossils.
John Hawks, a paleoanthropologist at the University of Wisconsin in Madison, said their application to these and other specimens promises to draw back the curtain on our species’ complicated and much-debated history.
Genetic differences mapped
Paabo and his colleagues have highlighted several intriguing genetic differences between modern humans and our primitive relatives that could prove significant.
Such differences may include genes involved in wiring the brain and ones that may be linked to autism.
The new gene-sequencing techniques also allowed scientists to more precisely calculate how much of modern humans’ DNA came not from Denisovans but Neanderthals.
“They found, to their puzzlement, that Native Americans and people in East Asia have more Neanderthal DNA than do people whose ancestors are from Europe, where most Neanderthals lived,” the LA Times report said.
That is “really, really interesting,” said study coauthor David Reich, a geneticist at Harvard Medical School in Boston.
Undiscovered ancient relatives?
Hawks also said it is very likely that modern humans have other undiscovered ancient relatives whose fossilized bones can reveal more secrets.
“It’s got to be just the beginning,” Hawks said.
The LA Times report also said the new genome gives scientists a sense of just how much of our genomes we owe to our extinct relatives.
Michelle Glantz, a biological anthropologist at Colorado State University in Fort Collins who was not involved in the study, said the part of the world where the Denisovan fossils were discovered could contain a particularly rich trove of archaic humans.
The LA Times said other intriguing finds from Central Asia included a fossil from Uzbekistan with a Neanderthal-like inner ear and a cranium resembling a modern human’s.
But it will take a lot more than DNA data to piece together the picture there, she said.
Evolutionary path
Scientists have so far determined that ancestors of humans emerged in Africa and migrated out to the rest of the world in successive waves.
It said the first globe-trotter was Homo erectus, whose trek began one to two million years ago.
Following them were the ancestor of the Neanderthals and Denisovans, who left Africa as far back as 800,000 years ago and replaced or interbred with descendants of Homo erectus.
The third wave of people, Homo sapiens, left Africa about 100,000 years ago and sometimes mated with the Neanderthals and Denisovans they encountered.
“The result is you and me and everyone else on the planet,” the LA Times report said. — TJD/HS, GMA News
“Studies have found that a woman’s own birth weight is a strong predictor of her children’s birth weights, leading to the suggestion that mothers pass signals to their fetuses of the environment the mother herself experienced in utero. Thus, it can take many generations of good nutrition for birth weight to substantially increase in previously undernourished populations. This is referred to as inter-generational effect. Inter-generational effect may play a role in explaining the lower birth weights in African-American as compared with European-American newborns; they may be partially a legacy of the undernutrition and high workloads of slavery and post-slavery period until the social reforms of the 1960s.”
-excerpt from Human Biology: An Evolutionary and Biocultural Perspective ed. by Stinson, Bogin, and O’Rourke
Although, low-birth weights are also due to systemic racism, but this portion is also important to consider. in other words, the trauma from our ancestors is embedded in our genes. it’s interesting that science is now backing up claims/beliefs that have been made from a spiritual perspective for a while. Queen Afua’s been talking womb health since the 80’s.
Read part of the article my Primate Behavior professor posted.
Omg.
The excitement level for this class, is pretty high.
I love primates so much.
I love this professor anyway, she taught my Economic Anthropology class.
This semester I actually have her for Primate Behavior and Peoples and cultures of Mesoamerica.
haha, she is a great example of a do all Anthropologist.
How to side the fibula using just the shaft
Correct identification of the fibula can be tricky. These notes by slipstreamborne might provide some help in case of confusion:
Ah, the fibula. Wonkiest of the long bones. I could never side the fuckers without extensive consultation of my osteo notes or keep the proximal and distal ends straight until a TA of mine showed me this trick, which has the awesome benefit of working both with whole fibulae and any shaft fragment (!!!!!!!) that includes part of the distal third or so of the shaft. AND you can do it by touch, which is a double bonus if you’re more tactile and shape oriented in your siding like me. AND IT WORKS UPSIDE DOWN, so you’re not completely fucked if you can’t figure out which end is up.
Okay, see that diagonal line there on the lateral view on the right? And how it defines a roughly triangular surface of bone just proximal to the distal end? That is the triangular subcutaneous area of the fibula and it is your new best friend.
(See T.D. White knows what I’m talking about.)
The key point here is that this very rough right triangle tapers towards the same direction that the bone is from. Just follow it with your eyes or your fingers, base to top. This one is a right, so it points up and to the right.
MORE EXAMPLES:
And if you have the bone upside down, you can still follow that diagonal line from the base to the top and it will point towards the side the bone is from.
So even if you have a professor who likes to hide bits of bones in boxes and make you identify and side them without looking, FEAR THE FIBULA NOT! Go forth and side it like a champ.
Source: slipstreamborne
The Female in Evolution
fora.tvWatch video of talks from the “Female in Evolution” symposium.
The California Academy of Sciences and the Leakey Foundation present a fascinating discussion on how today’s women are influenced by 50 million years of primate evolution.
After an introduction by primatologist Kelly Stewart, pioneering anthropologist Adrienne Zilhman will give the keynote presentation, titled “The Real Females of Human Evolution”. Zihlman’s research has had major impacts on the fields of physical anthropology and human evolution. In the 1970s, her critique of the “Man the Hunter” model opened the way for researchers to incorporate the role of females in hominid biological evolution and in human cultural development, an approach that has since become mainstream.
Chaired by Leslea Hlusko, the Paleoanthropology session will feature an overiew lecture by Daniel Lieberman, titled “Millions of Years of Moms,” and a case study lecture by Dean Falk on “The Role of Prehistoric Mothers in the Evolution of Language”.
The Behavioral session, chaired by Jill Pruetz, consists of an overview lecture by Joan Silk on “The Natural History of Social Bonds”. Dorothy Cheney will discuss “Primate Social Cognition” for the case study lecture.
For the afternoon keynote, Robert Martin will discuss “The Evolution of Mothering: How Long Should A Mother Suckle Her Baby?”.
Chaired by Brooke Scelza, the Hunter-forager session will have an overview lecture by Kristen Hawkes on “From Men’s Hunting to the Importance of Grandmothers: Lessons About Human Evolution from the Behavioral Ecology of Foragers”, and a case study by Rebecca Bliege Bird titled “Beyond Woman the Gatherer: Women’s Cooperative Hunting, Sharing and Social Networks in Aboriginal Australia”.
Each session of this intimate event will end with a question and answer session. Leslie Aiello will conclude the day’s proceedings with a symposium wrap-up.
If I weren't so obsessed with geology, I would seriously consider a career in biological anthropology.
If you’re unfamiliar with the term, biological anthropology is the study of humans at a genetic or evolutionary scale, instead of a cultural scale.
Analyzing the things that make humans human is one of the most beautiful things to think about. In some ways we are so unique. In others we are exactly like every other species. Combining the two—the things that make us special and the things that make us blend—is truly a celebration of life.
But, alas, Earth’s history is my one true love. I will marry her someday, and we will have many little rock babies who grow and prosper and truly improve the people who see them. Human evolution will remain my mistress, and I will love this mistress, as well. Perhaps I will have a few babies with her, and they will live on as successful little research papers, but I will never acknowledge them and they will have to learn to make their own way through the world.
