Cool

45,000-Year-Old Man Was Human-Neanderthal Mix

Project leader Chris Stringer of the Natural History Museum in London explained to Discovery News that the Siberian man belonged to a population that was closely related to the ancestors of today’s Europeans and Asians. He carried only slightly more Neanderthal DNA than they do.

“But his genomic segments of Neanderthal ancestry are on average about three times the length of those found in genomes today,” Stringer said.

This is highly informative, he continued, “as the chunks of Neanderthal DNA have been gradually broken up each generation since the time of interbreeding.”

He and his team charted the rate of that change to the present, when all living non-Africans possess 2 percent Neanderthal in their DNA. Going backwards in time, the researchers could then see that the mating with Neanderthals took place 7,000–10,000 years before the Siberian man lived. This means the human/Neanderthal interbreeding happened no more than 60,000 years ago.

How many of you think shoggoth when you read the headline below?

Researchers find new creature with 16,000 eyes

A team of scientists have discovered a strange new creature that reportedly had 16,000 eyes when it lived during the age of the dinosaurs.

Working on Kangaroo Island in South Australia, the team of scientists announced the discovery, saying they have turned up a Cambrian predator with 16,000 eyes. Anomalocaris is one of the weirdest and fiercest creatures from the Cambrian period, when multicellular life first evolved over 600 million years ago. The animals were about a meter long, and shaped as a flattened oval, a bit like a modern flounder.

I did. But then I play a Lovecraftian role-playing game each week. :)

Here's a more in-depth look at the creature, including an artist's rendition, from Discover magazine:

The sharp eyes of Anomalocaris, a top predator that lived half a billion years ago

Before killer whales and polar bears, before sharks and tyrannosaurs, the world’s top predator was probably a bizarre animal called Anomalocaris. It lived in the Cambrian period, over half a billion years ago, when life was confined to the seas and animals took on bizarre shapes that haven’t been seen since.

Another mystery cracked with genetics

Cave Painters Were Realists, DNA Study Finds

Scientists have wondered for years how much imagination went into animal drawings etched in caves around Europe, for example with depictions of spotted horses experts didn't think actually existed. Now, after DNA analysis from the fossilized bones of prehistoric horses, they found a genetic mutation that gives rise to a spotted coat.

Spotted Horses in Cave Art Weren’t Just a Figment, DNA Shows

Roughly 25,000 years ago in what is now southwestern France, human beings walked deep into a cave and left their enduring marks. Using materials like sticks, charcoal and iron oxides, they painted images of animals on the cave walls and ceilings — lions and mammoths and spotted horses, walking and grazing and congregating in herds.

Nifty

Oldest Known Sculpture Is Busty Clue to Brain Boom

From a cave in southwestern Germany, archaeologists have unearthed the oldest known piece of figurative art. More than an ancient artistic impulse, it may signify a profound change in modern human brains.

The small sculpture (about the size of a pinkie finger) is about 36,000 years old and depicts a woman with exaggerated breasts, which isn't surprising as these sorts of depictions, perhaps religious or fertility-related, have been found in other prehistorical digs.

Ancient poop turns back clock on first Americans

Humans in North America earlier than thought: DNA from fossilised foeces in Oregon provides evidence that humans inhabited the area 1,200 years sooner than theorised

Okay, technically they're coprolites (an excellent candidate for word-of-the-day). This pushes back the earliest accepted evidence of humans in the Americas to 14,300 years ago. (I'm aware of one claim for 48,000 years before present in Brazil, for example, so that's why I say 'accepted'. That claim is from radiocarbon dating of hearth remains. This is a mixture of DNA and radiocarbon dating for the Oregon site discussed in the article.)

Nifty, hmmm...?

Good night.