What rabbits can tell us about Neanderthal extinction

Date:

June 8, 2015

Source:

Bournemouth University

Summary:

When thinking about the extinction of Neanderthals some 30,000 years ago, rabbits may not be the first thing that spring to mind. But the way rabbits were hunted and eaten by Neanderthals and modern humans -- or not, as the case may be -- may offer vital clues as to why one species died out while the other flourished.

Read on ...

Neanderthals were not less intelligent than modern humans, scientists find

Researchers say there is no evidence that modern humans' cognitive superiority led to demise of Neanderthals

Ian Sample, science correspondent

The Guardian, Wednesday 30 April 2014 22.00 BST

Scientists have concluded that Neanderthals were not the primitive dimwits they are commonly portrayed to have been.

The view of Neanderthals as club-wielding brutes is one of the most enduring stereotypes in science, but researchers who trawled the archaeological evidence say the image has no basis whatsoever.

They said scientists had fuelled the impression of Neanderthals being less than gifted in scores of theories that purport to explain why they died out while supposedly superior modern humans survived.

Wil Roebroeks at Leiden University in the Netherlands said: "The connotation is generally negative. For instance, after incidents with the Dutch Ajax football hooligans about a week ago, one Dutch newspaper piece pleaded to make football stadiums off-limits for such 'Neanderthals'."

Continued

Jersey site that was last Neanderthal home is studied

An ice age site said to be one of the last known places Neanderthals lived is being studied to assess storm damage.

La Cotte in St Brelade, Jersey, was hit by south-westerly storms including winds of up to 100mph in February.

A British archaeological team commissioned by the Societe Jersiaise will examine the storm damage.

Dr Matt Pope, from the Institute of Archaeology, UCL, said it needed to consider the best solution for long-term preservation.

Continued

Is this the stomach-turning truth about what the Neanderthals ate?

The idea of these early humans being plant-eating, self-medicating sophisticates has been brought into question by the findings of researchers at London's Natural History Museum

It was the tell-tale tartar on the teeth that told the truth. Or at least, that is what it appeared to do. Researchers – after studying calcified plaque on Neanderthal fossil teeth found in El Sidrón cave in Spain – last year concluded that members of this extinct human species cooked vegetables and consumed bitter-tasting medicinal plants such as chamomile and yarrow.

These were not brainless carnivores, in other words. These were smart and sensitive people capable of providing themselves with balanced diets and of treating themselves with health-restoring herbs, concluded the researchers, led by Karen Hardy at the Catalan Institution for Research and Advanced Studies in Barcelona. Our vision of these long-extinct people needs adjusting, they argued.

But now this tale of ancient tartar has taken a new twist with two researchers at London's Natural History Museum challenging the Barcelona group's conclusions. Dental research does not prove thatNeanderthals were self-medicating, vegetable-eating sophisticates, one told the Observer. There are other, equally valid but decidedly more grizzly explanations to account for those microscopic fragments of herbs and plants found in Neanderthal teeth.

Continued

First look into workings of the Neanderthal brain

Editorial: "Gene breakthrough shows Neanderthals in new light"

BONES. That is all the passing millennia have left us of the Neanderthals and the more elusive Denisovans. Until recently, the main insights gleaned from these bones have been physical: what our cousins might have looked like, for instance, and how they moved. But cutting-edge genetic science is changing that.

We can now see, for the first time, which genes are switched on in humans but were not in Neanderthals and Denisovans, and vice versa. The findings point to subtle differences between our brain structure and function, and theirs.

The research, presented last week at the Society for Molecular Biology and Evolution meeting in Chicago, reveals that after our ancestors split from Neanderthals and Denisovans, they evolved differences in genes connected with cognitive abilities. Many of those genes are associated with mental disorders in modern humans.

Working out which genes ...

http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg21929264.400?cmpid=NLC%7CNSNS%7C2013-1807-GLOBAL&utm_medium=NLC&utm_source=NSNS&

Ancient secrets uncovered

DAMIEN BROWN

March 10, 2010 06:18am

A STUNNING archaeological discovery at Brighton could change scientific understanding of human occupation.

The discovery of artefacts that could be among the oldest in the world has prompted the State Government to consider adding a multi-million-dollar bridge to its Brighton bypass plans.

In a new development set to rock the scientific world, the artefacts found in the path of the proposed bypass could be twice as old as previously thought.

The discovery of the remains, that preliminary estimates show could be at least 40,000 years old, would give the scientific world a unique glimpse of a previously unknown period of human occupation this far south on the planet.

The remains found in the contentious Jordan River valley section of the $176 million bypass have forced the Department of Infrastructure, Energy and Resources back to the drawing board this week.

Plans have been redrawn to include a 70m elevated bridge span over the site, costing an extra $10 million to $15 million.

With a University of Melbourne report expected to be finalised this week, principal archaeologist Rob Paton has estimated the findings of stone tools and evidence of everyday life could be anywhere up to 40,000 years old. The previous estimate was about 18,000.

It has been estimated that anywhere up to three million artefacts could be uncovered in the 600m by 60m riverbank area.

Continued

Wanted: Surrogate for Neanderthal Baby

GenomeWeb caught what must be an interesting Q&A with George Church in Germany’s Spiegel Online (I can’t personally attest to the original story as it is behind a paywall). The Harvard Medical School geneticist is quoted as saying that eventually, an “adventurous female human” will be needed to be the surrogate mother for the first Neanderthal baby in some 30,000 years.

This isn’t the first time Church has talked publically about cloning a Neanderthal, or at least a near-Neanderthal. In 2009, when the Neanderthal genome was first reported, the New York Times described a scenario in which a current day human genome could be tweaked into the “Neanderthal equivalent” with tools of molecular biology. Eventually, this could lead to a Neanderthal-like embryo in need of a surrogate mother.

While the idea of reviving Neanderthals may sound farfetched, take for example the work of biologists to clone endangered or extinct non-human animals (see “Stem-Cell Engineering Offers a Lifeline to Endangered Species”). In 2009, the extinct bucardo, a subspecies Spanish ibex, was cloned from a frozen skin sample. The newborn died immediately due to respiratory failure, but its birth suggests that resurrecting extinct species may be possible.

http://www.technologyreview.com/view/510071/wanted-surrogate-for-neanderthal-baby/

Woolly mammoth skeleton found in perfect condition near Paris

The accidental discovery was made by archaeologists exploring an ancient Roman site 30 miles east of the French capital in Changis-Sur-Marne.

Researchers say it is the only the third long-haired mammoth to be discovered in France in the last 150 years, with such finds more common in northern Siberia.

Head of the excavation, Greg Bayle, said it was extremely rare to find such a well-preserved carcass of the long-extinct animal.

Archeologists work at the site along the Changis-sur-Marne riverbank (AP)

'Some archaeologists have spent have spent their lives dreaming of such a discovery with no luck,' he said.

He added that the mammoth, believed to have died as a relatively young adult, would have existed when the surrounding land was a vast grassy plain, with ice blocks flowing across the nearby River Marne. 

The dig team also found two flint blades next to the giant 9ft creature, suggesting it may have been hunted and killed for food by Neanderthals.

'The greatest prize are the flints nearby,' said Stephane Pean, another scientist involved.

'They show the presence of man on the side, and will help us built up a better understanding of the Neanderthals, who were contemporaries of the mammoth.'

Read more: http://www.metro.co.uk/weird/917295-woolly-mammoth-skeleton-found-in-perfect-condition-near-paris#ixzz2BjPAThdJ