The BBC has a short article on the first DNA isolated from a Neanderthal's nucleus. (Previous efforts have gotten DNA from their mitochondria, which are small energy-generating organelles.) The results, announced at a meeting, are the fruits of a new method for extracting genetic information from fossils. Theoretically it should be possible to pull together a lot of pieces of Neanderthal DNA into something approaching a genome. We'll have to wait for the big paper for the details, but these early clues suggest it will be worth the wait.
Update: More from John Hawks here.
More like this
Well it seems that Neanderthals may have had a taste for.. well... other Neanderthals.
I don't know if we should believe Svante Pääbo anymore, but his lab has some new findings re: Nean
As always on Fridays, there are new articles published in PLoS Computational Biology, PLoS Genetics and
That's great, maybe then we will know for sure if the Neanderthal were absorbed by the homo sapiens or not.