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- Studies indicate modern Europeans share between 1 and 4 per cent of their genes with Neanderthals
- Latest research backs up archaeological findings which suggest early man and Neanderthals lived side by side
Modern Europeans interbred with Neanderthals as recently as 37,000 years ago, a study has found.
Scientists from Harvard and the Max Planck Institute made the estimate in an attempt to work out why the Neanderthals are more closely related to peoples from outside Africa.
Their findings suggest that when modern humans emerged from that continent they encountered these other hominids and had children with them, who are the ancestors of people across Europe and Asia.
Cave dwellers: A reconstruction of how Neanderthal men and women may have lived in prehistoric times. New research suggests they interbred with the ancestors of modern humans as recently as 37,000 years ago
The new study backs up recent research which suggests that early humans and Neanderthals lived side by side in caves in northern Israel.
When the Neanderthal genome was sequenced in 2010 it revealed that people outside Africa share slightly more genetic variants with Neanderthals than Africans do.
Since then studies have indicated that modern Europeans share between 1 and 4 per cent of their genes with Neanderthals, who died out 28,000 years ago.
NEANDERTHAL MAN 'USED BIRD FEATHERS FOR DECORATION'
Neanderthal man is likely to have used bird feathers to decorate himself, according to research.
Evidence found in the cave homes of our evolutionary cousins, who were driven to extinction 30,000 years ago, suggests feathers were stripped from the remains of birds, to perhaps be worn as decorative ornaments or early jewellery.
Gibraltar Museum researchers Clive Finlayson and Kimberly Brown studied bird bones found at European sites used by Neanderthal man - and found that bird wings containing large feathers had regularly been chopped and carved by the inhabitants.
The latest theory draws more credence to the suggestion that the early hominids had a strong sense of tradition and culture.
One scenario that could explain this observation is that modern humans mixed with Neanderthals when they came out of Africa.
Modern humans begin to appear in the African fossil record about 200,000 years ago while Neanderthals appear in the European fossil record about 230,000 years ago and disappear about 30,000 years ago, the researchers wrote.
They lived in Europe and western Asia with a range that extended as far east as Siberia and as far south as the middle East.
The overlap of Neanderthals and modern humans in space and time suggests the possibility of interbreeding. Evidence both for and against interbreeding have been put forth based on the analysis of modern human DNA.
Dr Sriram Sankararaman, of Harvard Medical School's genetics department, and colleagues measured the length of DNA pieces in the genomes of Europeans that are similar to Neanderthals.
Since recombination between chromosomes when egg and sperm cells are formed reduces the size of such pieces in each generation, the Neanderthal-related pieces will be smaller the longer they have spent in the genomes of present-day people.
Based on their findings, published in the open-access journal PLoS Genetics, the team estimate that Neanderthals and modern humans last exchanged genes between 37,000 and 86,000 years ago.
Gene flow: This graphic from the study published in PLoS Genetics shows the route the ancestors of modern man took as they spread out from the heartlands of Africa
That date places the historical context of interbreeding well after modern humans appeared outside Africa but potentially before they started spreading across Eurasia.
This suggests that Neanderthals (or their close relatives) had children with the direct ancestors of present-day people outside Africa.
MailOnline Science reported last week how archaeological findings have led researchers to believe the two human sub-species lived in harmony in a coastal mountain range near the Israel-Lebanon border.
Heritage site: The Nahal Me'arot (Cave River) nature reserve containing caves used by prehistoric men
Tools: Sharp flint arrowheads were found by archeologists at the site in northern Israel
Stone axes and sharp flint arrowheads of both branches of the human race were discovered in the limestone caves at the Nahal Me'arot nature reserve at Mount Carmel in Haifa.
None of the bones uncovered at the World Heritage site had lethal wounds, which suggested to researchers that prehistoric men lived in peace with Neanderthals 80,000 years ago.
Neanderthals were much more sophisticated than they have been credited, according to archaeologist Daniel Kaufman, with their own burial rituals and probably language skills alongside their ability to make tools.
He told the Times that he believed peaceful cross-breeding was more likely than the result of rape attacks.
'If that interbreeding did take place, it must have been here. To call someone a Neanderthal is insulting to the Neanderthal,' Mr Kaufmann said.
Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2213219/Neanderthals-bred-modern-humans-Europe-recently-37-000-years-ago.html#ixzz28rhoxhSR
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