Sex with Neandertals Introduced Helpful and Harmful DNA into the Modern Human Genome

Scientific American Blog Network

By Kate Wong 

www.sci-news.com

Over the past few years a number of studies of ancient and contemporary genomes have reached the same stunning conclusion: early human species interbred, and people today carry DNA from archaic humans, including the Neandertals, as a result of those interspecies trysts. Now two new analyses of modern human genomes are providing insights into how the acquisition of Neandertal DNA affected anatomically modern Homo sapiens tens of thousands of years ago and how it continues to affect people today.

In the first study, Sriram Sankararaman and David Reich of Harvard University and their colleagues compared a complete Neandertal genome sequence with 1,004 modern human sequences to see which regions of the modern genome contain Neandertal DNA. Like other researchers before them, they observed that Asians and Europeans have DNA from Neandertals, whereas Africans have little or no Neandertal DNA. The pattern is consistent with a scenario in which early modern humans mated with Neandertals they encountered when they migrated out of Africa and into Eurasia, where Neandertals had lived for hundreds of thousands of years.

Moreover, the team determined that Neandertal DNA is not distributed evenly across the genome. Some genes have a high proportion of Neandertal ancestry (which is to say, many people today carry the Neandertal versions of these genes). Those genes with the highest Neandertal ancestry are associated with keratin, a protein found in skin and hair. The Neandertal variants of these genes may well have helped early modern humans adapt to the new environments they found themselves in as they spread into Eurasia. But the researchers also found that people today carry Neandertal genes that are associated with diseases including Crohn’s, type 2 diabetes and lupus.

Intriguingly, other regions of the modern human genome have no or very low Neandertal contribution, notably the X chromosome and genes related to the functioning of the testes. According to Sankararaman, Reich and their collaborators, the absence of Neandertal genetic material in these regions suggests that male hybrids who inherited a Neandertal X chromosome were infertile, and thus unable to pass their genes along to the next generation. The researchers detail their findings in a paper published in the December 30 Nature. (Scientific American is part of Nature Publishing Group.)

In the second study, published by Science, Benjamin Vernot and Joshua M. Akey of the University of Washington screened whole genome sequences from 665 living Europeans and Asians for telltale signs of Neandertal contributions. Their results show that although non-Africans individually inherited between 1 and 3 percent of their genomes from Neandertals, different people carry different bits of Neandertal genetic material. Together these sequences represent around 20 percent of the Neandertal genome.

Like the other team, Vernot and Akey found evidence that Neandertals passed along beneficial skin genes to modern humans, including some linked to pigmentation. And they, too, observed genome regions devoid of Neandertal contributions. One such region contains the gene FOXP2, which plays an important role in speech.

Vernot and Akey’s work is additionally interesting in that they were able to use statistical and computational methods to identify the Neandertal contributions in the genomes of modern-day people without using a Neandertal genome to guide their search. This work raises the possibility that simply by analyzing the genomes of people alive today, scientists will be able to discover and describe extinct human species that mated with early H. sapiens but that, unlike Neandertals, are unknown from the fossil record. Previous studies of genomes of living people have hinted at dalliances between early H. sapiens and unknown archaic humans in Africa. Perhaps this approach will shine a light on these mysterious skeletons in our closet.

How Climate Change and Plate Tectonics Shaped Human Evolution

By Mark Maslin and The Conversation

It should not be a surprise that East Africa was a hotbed of evolution, because over the last five million years everything about the landscape has changed.

The extraordinary forces of plate tectonics and a changing climate have transformed East Africa from a relatively flat, forested region to a mountainous fragmented landscape dominated by the rapid appearance and disappearance of huge, deep-water lakes. And from this highly variable landscape emerged an ape smart enough to question its own existence.

A cradle rocked by tectonics
Twenty million years ago the Indian and Asian continental plates clashed and pushed up the massive Tibetan plateau. In summer this plateau acts as a huge heat engine, absorbing solar energy which it transfers to the atmosphere, causing immense convection currents. With all this hot air rising, air is sucked in from all round, including moist air from the Indian Ocean that produces intense South East Asian monsoons.

This has a knock on affect of drawing moisture away from the African continent, and it was this that began the progressive drying out of East Africa. In terms of human evolution, this distinct split between the climate of Asia and Africa coincides with the split between Asian and African apes, the latter eventually evolving into us.

At the same time as the peaks of Tibet were thrusting upwards, the rifting process began in Ethiopia and gradually moved south finishing in Mozambique about one million years ago. This rifting was caused by a hotspot of magma under northern East Africa heating the crust causing it to split down the middle like an overdone apple pie.

The rifting process produced a deep, wide, hanging valley half a mile above sea level with uplifted shoulders or mountain ranges on either side rising up to two miles high. The affects of the Rift Valley formation on the local climate was dramatic.

Keep reading on scientificamerican >>

Newly-Discovered Fossilized Skull Could Prove Homo Erectus Sole Human Ancestor

breitbart

By William Bigelow 

AFP

A new discovery of an ancient skull from an ancestor of humans has scientists backtracking from their earlier claims that separate species in Africa were the progenitors of the human race.

The skull, found in the Georgian villiage of Dmanisi, is roughly two million years old and is the only intact human ancestor’s skull ever found that dates from the early Pleistocene Era. Dmanisi has yielded bones thought to be the remains of three males, one of them elderly, a young female, and a child whose sex is indeterminate.

Christoph Zollikofer, a professor at Zurich University's Anthropological Institute, said, "Nobody has ever seen such a well-preserved skull from this period. This is the first complete skull of an adult early Homo. They simply did not exist before.” His awe was echoed by Tim White, from the University of California, Berkeley, who said, "The significance is difficult to overstate. It is stunning in its completeness. This is going to be one of the real classics in paleoanthropology." The Dmanisi bones are believed to be remnants of Homo erectus, the first ancestor who resembled modern humans and originated in Africa.

Zollikofer continued, "Everything that lived at the time of the Dmanisi was probably just Homo erectus. We are not saying that palaeoanthropologists did things wrong in Africa, but they didn't have the reference we have. Part of the community will like it, but for another part it will be shocking news."

The leader of the Dmanisi excavations, David Lordkipanidze, said, "If you found the Dmanisi skulls at isolated sites in Africa, some people would give them different species names. But one population can have all this variation. We are using five or six names, but they could all be from one lineage." Lordkipanidze theorized that the belief that Australopithecus sediba was a direct ancestor of humans was now probably wrong.

The consequences of the Dmanisi discovery could mean that species such as Homo rudolfensis, Homo gautengensis, Homo ergaster, and possibly Homo habilis would be dismissed.

White explained:

Some palaeontologists see minor differences in fossils and give them labels, and that has resulted in the family tree accumulating a lot of branches. The Dmanisi fossils give us a new yardstick, and when you apply that yardstick to the African fossils, a lot of that extra wood in the tree is dead wood. It's arm-waving.

But Chris Stringer, head of human origins at the Natural History Museum in London, took issue with the idea that Homo Erectus was solely responsible for the ancestry of humans, saying:

I think they will be proved right that some of those early African fossils can reasonably join a variable Homo erectus species. But Africa is a huge continent with a deep record of the earliest stages of human evolution, and there certainly seems to have been species-level diversity there prior to two million years ago. So I still doubt that all of the 'early Homo' fossils can reasonably be lumped into an evolving Homo erectus lineage. We need similarly complete African fossils from two to 2.5m years ago to test that idea properly.

Lee Berger, at the University of Witwatersrand, who discovered the species Australopithecus sediba, took issue with the conclusion drawn by the Dmanisis team. He said:

This is a fantastic and important discovery, but I don't think the evidence they have lives up to this broad claim they are making. They say this falsifies that Australopithecus sediba is the ancestor of Homo. The very simple response is, no it doesn't. What all this screams out for is more and better specimens. We need skeletons, more complete material, so we can look at them from head to toe. Any time a scientist says 'we've got this figured out' they are probably wrong. It's not the end of the story.

Living Relatives of Iceman Mummy Found

Discovery News

By Rossella Lorenzi 

Ötzi the Iceman has at least 19 living male relatives in the Austrian Tirol, according to a genetic study into the origins of the people who now inhabit the region.

Scientists from the Institute of Legal Medicine at Innsbruck Medical University analyzed DNA samples taken from 3,700 blood donors in the Tyrol region of Austria.

During their study, they discovered that 19 individuals share a particular genetic mutation with the 5,300-year-old mummy, whose full genome was published last year.

PHOTOS: Iceman Mummy 20 Yrs On: Mysteries Remain

“These men and the Iceman had the same ancestors,” Walther Parson, the forensic scientist who carried out the study, told the Austrian Press Agency.

The researchers focused on parts of the human DNA which are generally inherited unchanged.

“In men it is the Y chromosomes and in females the mitochondria. Eventual changes arise due to mutations, which are then inherited further,” Parson explained.

People with the same mutations are categorized in haplogroups. Designed with letters, haplogroups allow researchers to trace early migratory routes since they are often associated with defined populations and geographical regions.

Indeed, Ötzi’s haplogroup is very rare in Europe.

“The Iceman had the halogroup G, sub category G-L91. In our research we found another 19 people with this genetic group and subgroup,” Parson said.

ANALYSIS: The Ice Mummy: Little-Known Facts

Having carried Y chromosome haplogroup analysis, Parson was able to trace only the male descendants of the Neolithic man.

So far the 19 individuals have not been informed of their genetic relationship to Ötzi.

Found in 1991 in a melting glacier in the Ötztal Alps (hence the name), the mummy is one of the most heavily investigated human corpses of all time.

Scientists discovered that Ötzi had brown eyes and very bad teeth, was lactose intolerant, had a genetic predisposition for an increased risk for coronary heart disease and probably had Lyme disease.

It’s certain he died a violent death: In 2007, CT scans showed that an arrowhead had lacerated his left subclavian artery, leading to fast bleeding.

ANALYSIS: The Iceman Suffered Brain Damage Before Death

CAT scan of the mummy’s brain and a paleoproteomic study have recently pointed to a cerebral trauma — a violent blow to the head — as the cause of death.

As investigation into the mummy continues, new relatives, alive and well, could be added to the list of the 19 descendants.

According to Parson, the genetic mutation might be also found in the nearby Swiss region of Engadine and in Italy’s South Tyrol region.

“We have already found Swiss and Italian partners so that we can continue our research,” he said.

Image: Facial reconstruction of Ötzi the Iceman. Credit: Heike Engel-21Lux/SÜdtiroler Archäologiemuseum

Huge foreheads, flat faces and saucer-like eyes: How the human face might look in 100,000 years

Mail Online

Just as the human face has evolved considerably since stone age times so it is expected to keep changing in the future.

Today the human brain is three times the size of our primate ancestors. As our brains grew so did our heads get bigger, our skulls expanded and our features became flatter.

Now with the advent of wearable technology, such as Google Glass, how will our heads and faces evolve in 20,000 years, 60,000 years and even 100,000 years from now?

100,000 years: The human face will have evolved to be proportioned to the 'golden ratio,' with unnervingly large eyes featuring a sideways blink

2013: A typical man and woman

This was the question posed by artist and researcher Nickolay Lamm from MyVoucherCodes.co.uk when he quizzed Dr Alan Kwan, who holds a PhD in computational genomics from Washington University in St Louis. 

Based on their discussions Lamm has created a stunning series of images which display one possible evolution for the human race over the next 100,000 years.

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2337804/Huge-foreheads-flat-faces-saucer-like-eyes-How-human-face-look-100-000-years.html#ixzz2cRGpATb0

Evidence Indicates Human Presence in Cuba 8,000 Years Ago

Latina

The presence of humans in Cuba hypothetically dates from between 8,000 and 10,000 years ago, according to an archaeological census performed by the Anthropology Institute within the Cuban Science, Technology and Environment Ministry.

The data for the archaeological census has been collected for the past two years and is expected to wrap up in January 2014. It includes research done by experts, historians, archaeologists, institutions, hobbyists and the officials heading it, according to the state-run Prensa Latina news agency.

Archaeologist Jose Jimenez Santander and the head of the archaeology department at the Cuban institute of Anthropology, Alfonso Cordova, told Fox News Latino that so far more than 3,200 aboriginal archaeological sites have been located on the island.

Some of the sites found were tagged human dwelling because there was evidence of food, tools and trash, which all show that those sites were once ancient communities inhabited by humans.

"Others functioned as rest stops, since they are areas ... without evidence of prolonged habitation made by ... mobile communities that moved periodically but repeated their stays, as well as inhabited caves," Jimenez Santander said to Fox News Latino.

He also went on to say there are signs that indicate the use of caves for burials, ceremonies, cave painting sites, shell workshops to make vessels and other objects that further suggest the presence of humans. 

Read more: http://www.latina.com/lifestyle/news/evidence-indicates-human-presence-cuba-years-ago#ixzz2bmWSPgIj

Human intelligence is declining according to Stanford geneticist

follow the money

http://rt.com/usa/news/intelligence-stanford-years-fragile-531/

Ever can’t help but think you’re surrounded by idiots? A leading scientist at Stanford University thinks he has the answer, and the bad news is things aren’t likely to get any better.

Dr. Gerald Crabtree, a geneticist at Stanford, has published a study that he conducted to try and identify the progression of modern man’s intelligence. As it turns out, however, Dr. Crabtree’s research led him to believe that the collective mind of mankind has been on more or a less a downhill trajectory for quite some time.

According to his research, published in two parts starting with last year’s ‘Our fragile intellect. Part I,’ Dr. Crabtree thinks unavoidable changes in the genetic make-up coupled with modern technological advances has left humans, well, kind of stupid. He has recently published his follow-up analysis, and in it explains that of the roughly 5,000 genes he considered the basis for human intelligence, a number of mutations over the years has forced modern man to be only a portion as bright as his ancestors.

“New developments in genetics, anthropology and neurobiology predict that a very large number of genes underlie our intellectual and emotional abilities, making these abilities genetically surprisingly fragile,” he writes in part one of his research. “Analysis of human mutation rates and the number of genes required for human intellectual and emotional fitness indicates that we are almost certainly losing these abilities,” he adds in his latest report.

From there, the doctor goes on to explain that general mutations over the last few thousand years have left mankind increasingly unable to cope with certain situations that perhaps our ancestors would be more adapted to.

“I would wager that if an average citizen from Athens of 1000 BC were to appear suddenly among us, he or she would be among the brightest and most intellectually alive of our colleagues and companions, with a good memory, a broad range of ideas, and a clear-sighted view of important issues. Furthermore, I would guess that he or she would be among the most emotionally stable of our friends and colleagues. I would also make this wager for the ancient inhabitants of Africa, Asia, India or the Americas, of perhaps 2000–6000 years ago. The basis for my wager comes from new developments in genetics, anthropology, and neurobiology that make a clear prediction that our intellectual and emotional abilities are genetically surprisingly fragile.”

According to the doctor, humans were at their most intelligent when “every individual was exposed to nature’s raw selective mechanisms on a daily basis.” Under those conditions, adaption, he argued, was much more of a matter than fight or flight. Rather, says the scientists, it was a sink or swim situation for generations upon generations.

“We, as a species, are surprisingly intellectually fragile and perhaps reached a peak 2,000 to 6,000 years ago,” he writes. “If selection is only slightly relaxed, one would still conclude that nearly all of us are compromised compared to our ancient ancestors of 3,000 to 6,000 years ago.”

———–

are we are smarter than 6000 years ago?..they had great minds who could read the stars and knew maths..they made pyramids back then..we cant copy that now to that sort of precision..we had to use our minds for everything to live and survive..we have better technology now but whats that mean for human brain development?..i think hes probably correct..

Wanted: 'Adventurous woman' to give birth to Neanderthal man

babalublog

By Carlos Eire

Another liberal plot to take over the world has been leaked to the press.   Get this: a superior but extinct humanoid race is about to be unleashed on the world by Harvard University.

And, as we all know, since all intelligent human beings are liberals, breeding these ultra-brainy beings who once roamed much of the earth will mean the extinction of conservatism.

Yeah.  Wow.  Never mind what Darwin said about survival of the fittest.  Imagine the laws these beings could enact!  Utopia, here we come....  out with the gun-totin' , bible thumpin' trailer trash.

With proper funding from George Soros and the NSF, this breeding program might actually turn out to be the crowning glory of  President Obama's second term.  Rumor has it that women are lining up at Harvard to take part in this noble experiment.

Wanted: 'Adventurous woman' to give birth to Neanderthal man - Harvard professor seeks mother for cloned cave baby

* Professor George Church of Harvard Medical School believes he can reconstruct Neanderthal DNA
* His ambitious plan requires a human volunteer willing to allow the DNA to be put into stem cells, then a human embryo

By ALLAN HALL and FIONA MACRAE, Daily Mail

They're usually thought of as a brutish, primitive species. So what woman would want to give birth to a Neanderthal baby?

Yet this incredible scenario is the plan of one of the world’s leading geneticists, who is seeking a volunteer to help bring man’s long-extinct close relative back to life.

Professor George Church of Harvard Medical School believes he can reconstruct Neanderthal DNA and resurrect the species which became extinct 33,000 years ago.

His scheme is reminiscent of Jurassic Park but, while in the film dinosaurs were created in a laboratory, Professor Church’s ambitious plan requires a human volunteer.

He said his analysis of Neanderthal genetic code using samples from bones is complete enough to reconstruct their DNA. He said: ‘Now I need an adventurous female human. ‘It depends on a hell of a lot of things, but I think it can be done.’

Professor Church’s plan would begin by artificially creating Neanderthal DNA based on genetic code found in fossil remains. He would put this DNA into stem cells.

These would be injected into cells from a human embryo in the early stages of life.  It is thought that the stem cells would steer the development of the hybrid embryo on Neanderthal lines, rather than human ones.

After growing in the lab for a few days, the ‘neo-Neanderthal’ embryo would be implanted in the womb of a surrogate mother – the volunteer. Professor Church, 58, is a pioneer in synthetic biology who helped initiate the Human Genome Project that mapped our DNA.

He says Neanderthals were not the lumbering brutes of the stereotype, but highly intelligent. Their brains were roughly the same size as man’s, and they made primitive tools.

He believes his project could benefit mankind.

Read more HERE.  Prepare to be fascinated...

But, wait a minute...  maybe the Harvard professor is not the first to go down this daring route?   What if someone beat him to the punch around 87 years ago?   Startling proof of such an experiment is offered below:

Smarter than all other humans, and smart as the Devil:  Super Sabio! Inteligentisimo! El seso maximo! Sabelotodo supremo!

Hobbit Humans Come to Life With New Fossils

A reconstruction of a Hobbit face.

Susan Hayes, University of Wollongong

discovery

By Jennifer Viegas 

New bones attributed to Homo floresiensis -- aka the "Hobbit Human" -- along with other recent findings, are helping to reveal what members of this species looked like, how they behaved, and their origins.

The latest findings, described in a Journal of Human Evolution paper, are wrist bones unearthed on the Indonesian island of Flores. Since they are nearly identical to other such bones for the Hobbit found at the site, they refute claims that H. floresiensis never existed.

"The tiny people from Flores were not simply diseased modern humans," Caley Orr, lead author of the paper, told Discovery News.

"The new species of human stood approximately 3' 6" tall, giving it its nickname 'The Hobbit,'" continued Orr, who is an assistant professor in the Department of Anatomy at Midwestern University.

He said that they were "similar to modern humans in many respects." For example, he explained that they walked on two legs, had small canine teeth, and lived what appears to have been an iconic "cave man'" lifestyle.

"Stone tools and evidence of fire use were found in the cave, along with the remains of butchered animals, such as Stegodon (an extinct elephant relative), indicating that meat was a part of diet," Orr said.

He and his colleagues, however, also point out the differences between the Hobbit individuals and modern humans.

The Hobbits had arms that were longer than their legs, giving them a slightly more ape-like structure. Their skulls had no bony chins, so their faces had more of an oval shape. Their forehead was sloping. The inferred brain size was tiny, putting them in the IQ range of chimpanzees.

"Remarkably, the feet were also long relative to the legs, as fantasy fans might expect of a Hobbit," he added.

The Hobbit's wrist looked like that of early human relatives, such as Australopithecus, but the key ancestral candidate now is Homo erectus, "Upright Man."

It is possible that a population of H. erectus became stranded on the Indonesian island and dwarfed there over time. Orr said that "sometimes happens to larger animals that adapt to small island environments."

A problem, however, is that H. erectus is somewhat more modern looking than the Hobbit, so researchers are still seeking more clues.

Another question concerns whether or not the Hobbits ever mated with modern humans. There is evidence that happened to Neanderthals, which have left traces of their genome in modern human DNA. So far, however, conditions have not been right to extract DNA from H. floresiensis bones.

Nonetheless, the Hobbit -- which went extinct relatively recently during the Pleistocene -- is now better known due to the new discoveries.

"These fossils provide further, clear evidence that H. floresiensis is in no way a pathological modern human, or that its primitive morphology is related simply to its small body size," said Tracy Kivell, a paleoanthropologist from the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology. "Instead, it is clearly its own, unique and very intriguing species."

Kivell added, "What is particularly interesting is that H. floresiensis is associated with such a long, well-documented history of stone tools. (Its primitive hand and wrist were) still apparently capable of making and using stone tools, suggesting that H. floresiensis solved the morphological and manipulative demands of tool-making and tool-use in a different way than Neanderthals and ourselves."

Orr and his team continue to study the Hobbit humans, with at least one other paper about the interesting species in the works.

Waorani tribe: Bathing in the river

BBCWorldwide

Himba tribe: Unwanted Marriage

BBCWorldwide

La vida diaria de la Tribu Zoe

masDocumentales

La venta de indios mayas a Cuba

cinereverso.org

Izaskun Álvarez Cuartero
(Universidad de Salamanca)

DE ESPAÑOLES, YUCATECOS E INDIOS: LA VENTA DE MAYAS A CUBA Y LA CONSTRUCCIÓN IMAGINADA DE UNA NACIÓN

Resumen: El presente trabajo analizará brevemente la situación social, económica y política de los mayas en el desarrollo colonial peninsular y posteriormente en la construcción independiente de Yucatán hasta el estallido de la Guerra de Castas (1847). El análisis central de la investigación pretende mostrar que durante el período anteriormente mencionado se pueden establecer una serie de parámetros para enunciar y diseñar la nación maya yucateca. Me centraré en explicar el establecimiento de las relaciones entre la población maya y los españoles y su desarrollo durante la génesis del estado-nación mexicano y estado-nación yucateco. Dentro de este discurso es para mi fundamental analizar cómo durante los primeros años de la Guerra de Castas el gobierno yucateco participó en la venta a Cuba de indios mayas apresados durante el conflicto, este tráfico escondía un intento de hacer desaparecer del territorio a todos aquellos indios que pudieran impedir el diseño de un Yucatán blanco y próspero, donde no tenían cabida los elementos sociales que dificultaban ese proyecto. También examinaré la producción de textos racistas en Yucatán a través de varios documentos con especial atención en los aspectos biopolíticos que se perciben en los mismos.

Leer mas en [PDF] DE ESPAÑOLES, YUCATECOS E INDIOS: LA VENTA DE MAYAS A CUBA Y LA CONSTRUCCIÓN IMAGINADA DE UNA NACIÓN >>

Who Didn't Have Sex with Neanderthals?

Discovery news

Charles Choi, LiveScience Contributor

spiegel.de

The only modern humans whose ancestors did not interbreed with Neanderthals are apparently sub-Saharan Africans, researchers say.

New findings suggest modern North Africans carry genetic traces from Neanderthals, modern humanity's closest known extinct relatives.

Although modern humans are the only surviving members of the human lineage, others once roamed the Earth, including the Neanderthals. Genetic analysis of these extinct lineages' fossils has revealed they once interbred with our ancestors, with recent estimates suggesting that Neanderthal DNA made up 1 percent to 4 percent of modern Eurasian genomes. Although this sex apparently only rarely produced offspring, this mixing was enough to endow some people with the robust immune systems they enjoy today.  More >>

Unsolved Mysteries Redux The Unexplained Nazca Lines [Documental]

Unsolved Mysteries - The Unexplained - Iceman

Siberia home to yeti, bigfoot enthusiasts insist

• Miriam Elder guardian.co.uk

The Abominable Snowman, a 50s horror film, would probably be dismissed by modern yeti enthusiasts as bunkum. Photograph: Cine Text/Allstar/Sportsphoto Ltd
The vast Siberian tundra holds untold mysteries, from once-secret nuclear installations to alleged UFO crash sites. Now, a team of scientists say they are "95%" sure that Russia's wintry expanse is home to the mythical yeti, otherwise known as the abominable snowman. More than a dozen scientists and yeti enthusiasts flew in from Canada, Estonia, Sweden and the US to exchange findings with their Russian counterparts at a day-long conference in the town of Tashtagol, some 2,000 miles east of Moscow in the Kemerovo region. Locals there have reported an increase in sightings of a creature in recent years. A two-day expedition to the region's Azassky cave and Karatag peak over the weekend "collected irrefutable evidence" of the yeti's existence there, the Kemerovo government claimed in a statement. "In one of the detected tracks, Russian scientist Anatoly Fokin noted several hairs that might belong to the yeti," it added. Scientists also found footprints, a presumed bed and various other markers. "Conference participants came to the conclusion that the artefacts found give 95% evidence of the habitation of the 'snow man' on Kemerovo region territory," the statement said. "I know they exist – I see them every day," a conference participant, Robin Lynn, said by telephone from Kemerovo. She says she has a family of 10 yeti-like creatures living on her land in the US state of Michigan. Evidence of yeti life of the creature has allegedly been found in the Himalayas and North America, where it is know as sasquatch, or bigfoot. John Binderangel, a Canadian wildlife biologist who has been studying the yeti for 30 years, said the Siberian expedition offered further proof of the beast's existence. "We were shown some twisted willow branches that are referred to as markers – they were convincing evidence of this hominoid," he said. "There were also some tracks, but we're not quite sure what to make of them." Conference participants called for the launch of a campaign to "work out a more serious relationship [to the yeti] in society and mass media", the Kemerovo government said. They also proposed opening a university research centre. The Kemerovo government has hosted a number of stunts aimed at boosting the region's reputation as a yeti centre. Last month, it welcomed former heavyweight boxing champion Nikolai Valuev on a search for the yeti. The 7ft "beast from the east" reportedly failed in his quest.

DNA Evidence Reveals A New Breed Of Proto-Humans

Kevin Lincoln
Recent DNA evidence reveals that Denisovans, a mysterious humanlike offshoot of Neandertals, interbred with early homo sapiens in what was likely the first of two Stone Age migrations into southern Asia, ScienceNews reports.

Before this, scientists had thought there was only one migration about 65,000 years ago.

The evidence, presented in two new scientific papers, comes from analysis of a fingerbone fossil and a lock of an Aborigine man's hair. It indicates both a larger Denisovan DNA presence in modern humans than expected and widespread interbreeding between early humans and humanlike groups.

According to ScienceNews, all non-Africans possess about 1%-4% Neandertal DNA. The report in the American Journal of Human Genetics found that this subset of Oceanians possesses 4%-6% Denisovan DNA. And a lack of Neandertal DNA in Africans shows that interbreeding took place following human migration into Europe.

Read more: http://www.businessinsider.com/dna-evidence-reveals-a-new-breed-of-proto-humans-2011-9?nr_email_referer=1&utm_source=Triggermail&utm_medium=email&utm_term=Business%20Insider%20Select&utm_campaign=BI%20Select%20Recurring%202011-09-23#ixzz1Yopu9LFs

Este es el rostro de una mujer de la edad del hielo

La Patilla

Se trata de La Mujer de las Palmas, que vivió en la Edad de Hielo (hace 10,000 años) en lo que hoy es la península de Yucatán (Mexico), y que fue extraída en 2002 por especialistas del Instituto Nacional de Antropología e Historia (INAH) de las profundidades de una cueva inundada cercana a Tulum.

Es la reconstrucción del aspecto físico de uno de los tres esqueletos humanos más antiguos de América, hallados en cuevas sumergidas en la costa oriental de Quintana Roo.

La recreación de cómo pudo haber sido esta antigua mujer se hizo en un taller francés siguiendo los patrones establecidos por antropólogos físicos mexicanos, quienes determinaron que el esqueleto encontrado en la cueva Las Palmas, a 4.5 km de Tulum, era de un individuo del sexo femenino, entre 44 y 50 años al momento de morir, con 152 cm de estatura y un peso de 58 kilos.

La probable identidad de la Mujer de Las Palmas se logró gracias a que el esqueleto fue encontrado prácticamente completo (90%) y en muy buen estado de conservación, y pudieron practicársele los más avanzados estudios de antropología forense. La escultura de cuerpo completo, realizada en Francia, ofrece una aproximación de las características físicas que pudo tener la Mujer de Las Palmas, cuya antigüedad oscila entre los 10,000 y 12,000 años.

Su estructura corporal, piel y ojos es semejante al de las poblaciones del sureste asiático, lo que refuerza la hipótesis de que al continente americano no sólo llegaron movimientos migratorios del norte de Asia sino también del centro y del sur.

El antropólogo Alejandro Terrazas destacó que uno de los descubrimientos a partir del estudio del cráneo de la Mujer de Las Palmas es que su fisonomía no corresponde con las características de las poblaciones indígenas mexicanas y tampoco a los pobladores más antiguos de América, como los paleoamericanos y los amerindios, “su rostro se asemeja más a la gente del sureste asiático, como la de Indonesia”.

Para el científico, esto indica que el continente americano fue poblado con varios movimientos migratorios, no solamente a partir de una o dos oleadas procedentes del norte de Asia a través del Estrecho de Bering, como refiere una de las teorías más divulgadas.

“La historia no es así de sencilla, fueron muchos movimientos. Lo que nos revela La Mujer de Las Palmas es que hubo más migraciones del centro y sur de Asia, a partir de las cuales se dio una evolución local en América, acarreando una gran diversidad de poblaciones ya existente durante la época de la cultura clovis (13 mil 500 años).“

Texto cortesía www.noticiasinteresantes.blogcindario.com

Mona Lisa's Skeleton Found?

By Rossella Lorenzi 

Archaeologists excavating an abandoned nunnery in Florence on Thursday unearthed a complete skeleton that might belong to Lisa Gherardini, the woman believed to have inspired Leonardo da Vinci's Mona Lisa.

Found beneath the floor of an ancient church in the now derelict Convent of St. Ursula, the grave contained a whole and connected skeleton, which had partially collapsed under the weight of the earth.

"Preliminary analysis of fragments of the cranium and the pelvis suggest that this was an adult female," Giorgio Gruppioni, an anthropologist at the University of Bologna, told reporters.

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