Skulls With Mix Of Neanderthal And Primitive Traits Illuminate Human Evolution b4in.org/q4wC Ancient skulls in a Spanish cave show a mix of Neanderthal and more primitive traits, suggesting Neanderthals evolved their defining characteristics in stages Researchers studying a collection of skulls in a Spanish cave identified both Neanderthal-derived features and features associated with more primitive humans in these bones. This “mosaic pattern” supports a theory of Neanderthal evolution that suggests Neanderthals developed their defining features separately, and at different times – not all at once. Having this new data from the Sima de los Huesos site, as the Spanish cave is called, has allowed scientists to better understand hominin evolution during the Middle Pleistocene, a period in which the path of hominin evolution has been controversial. “The Middle Pleistocene was a long period of about half a million years during which hominin evolution didn’t proceed through a slow process of change with just one kind of hominin quietly evolving towards the classic Neanderthal,” said lead author Juan-Luis Arsuaga, Professor of Paleontology at the Complutense University of Madrid. “With the skulls we found,” co-author Ignacio Martínez, Professor of Paleontology at the University of Alcalá, added, “it was possible to characterize the cranial morphology of a human population of the European Middle Pleistocene for the first time.” About 400 to 500 thousand years ago, in the heart of the Pleistocene, archaic humans split off from other groups of that period living in Africa and East Asia, ultimately settling in Eurasia, where they evolved characteristics that would come to define the Neandertal lineage. Several hundred thousand years after that, modern humans—who had evolved in Africa—settled in Eurasia, too. They interbred with Neanderthals, but even then showed signs of reproductive incompatibility. Because of this, modern humans eventually replaced Neanderthals. More with additional photos of other skulls b4in.org/q4wC
Posted on: Fri, 20 Jun 2014 05:59:31 +0000
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