He Jiankui and two collaborators were found guilty of “illegal medical practices” He Jiankui, the Chinese researcher who stunned the world last year by announcing
Month: April 2023
Oldest Stone Tools Ever Found Were Not Made by Human Hands, Study Suggests
(Image: Fossilized hippopotamid skeleton with Oldowan artifacts) Archaeologists have revealed what could be the oldest stone tools ever found, and they think someone other than
Viruses Are a Primary Driver of Human Evolution
Scientists have always known of the impact that viral pathogens have had on Homo sapiens evolution. Remnants of viral DNA can found dispersed throughout the human genome,
Primate Speciation: A Case Study of African Apes
Biological anthropologists use genetic data to understand the evolutionary relationships that humans share with great apes and to examine how our genetic history differs from
The Origin of the Human Species: a Chromosome Fusion?
Some 60 years ago, two researchers, Joe Hin Tjio and Albert Levan, discovered that the number of chromosomes (karyotype) in humans was 46 chromosomes, that is, 23 pairs
Did Humanity Really Arise in One Place?
New evidence is prompting researchers to rethink Homo sapiens’ origin story—and what it means to be human. ✽ AS A UNIVERSITY STUDENT in the early 2010s, I
The “Robust” Australopiths
The “robust” australopiths are a group of hominins with large cheek teeth and strongly built jaws that lived alongside the earliest members of our own
Y Chromosome from Early Modern Humans Replaced Neanderthal Y
A selective advantage may have led the modern human Y chromosome to sweep through the Neanderthal population after it was introduced via interbreeding more than
Fossil DNA Reveals New Twists in Modern Human Origins
Modern humans and more ancient hominins interbred many times throughout Eurasia and Africa, and the genetic flow went both ways. Introduction Humans today are mosaics,
Discovered: The earliest known common genetic condition in human evolution
Genetic diseases are fairly common today, with more than one in 25 children being born with one. But the evolutionary history of such conditions is mysterious. Which