#evolution study

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Nobody knows who she was, just that she was different: A teenage girl from over 50,000 years ago of such odd uniqueness she appeared to be a

Using a statistical technique called Bayesian inference, the researchers found evidence of what they call a "third introgression" – a 'ghost' archaic population that modern humans interbred with during the African exodus.

"This population is either related to the Neanderthal-Denisova clade or diverged early from the Denisova lineage," the researchers wrote in their paper, meaning that it's possible this third population in humanity's sexual history was possibly a mix themselves of Neanderthals and Denisovans.

Nobody knows who she was, just that she was different: A teenage girl from over 50,000 years ago of such odd uniqueness she appeared to be a 'hybrid' ancestor to modern humans that scientists hadn't seen before.

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Soon After Dinosaur Decimation, Our Primate Ancestors Began Pouncing on Prey

Nails helped them climb trees quietly, and forward-facing eyes helped with depth perception to aid in precise leaping

Small primates like Teilhardina, which lived in the forest canopy of ancient China 55 million years ago, were early adopters of some of our evolutionary family’s most famous characteristics.

Our gifts of depth perception, dexterous hands and more can be drawn back to a time much closer to the dinosaurian heyday than the present. The first primate with a grasping toe dates back to 56 million years ago, the first big increase in brain size occurred 55 million years ago and the number of teeth we have can be traced back to 30 million years ago, Silcox points out. But exactly why our early ancestors came to have such telltale traits has been debated by experts for decades.

Nails would be quieter than claws while sneaking up on prey, for example, and the ability to leap would allow early primates to get the jump on their prey, with binocular vision being critical for gauging the distance. To test this idea, Wu and colleagues didn’t look to fossils—they looked to genes involved in what primates digest and how those genetic markers have changed over time

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The mechanism for peptide-forming reactions to occur in water — something that has baffled scientists for decades.

Raw amino acids — something that meteorites delivered to early Earth daily — can react and latch together to form peptides. These are the building blocks of proteins and, eventually, life. Strangely, the process requires the loss of a water molecule, which seems exceedingly improbable in a wet, aqueous, or oceanic environment. For life to form, it required water. However, it also needed space away from the water.

The swift rates of these reactions make catalysts unnecessary, speeding up the reactions and, in the case of early Earth chemistry, making the evolution of life possible.

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Phys.org: Study traces evolution of acoustic communication.

https://phys.org/news/2020-01-evolution-acoustic.html