Neanderthals wouldn't have eaten their sprouts either

PhysOrg ^ | August 12th, 2009 | Denholm Barnetson

[SunkenCiv]

Spanish researchers say they have found that a gene in modern humans that makes some people dislike a bitter chemical called phenylthiocarbamide, or PTC, was also present in Neanderthals hundreds of thousands of years ago... The scientists made the discovery after recovering and sequencing a fragment of the TAS2R38 gene taken from 48,000-year-old Neanderthal bones found at a site in El Sidron, in northern Spain, they said in a report released Wednesday by the Spanish National Research Council (CSIC)... Substances similar to PTC give a bitter taste to green vegetables such as Brussels sprouts, broccoli and cabbage as well as some fruits. But they are also present in some poisonous plants, so having a distaste for it makes evolutionary sense... What intrigued the researchers most is that Neanderthals also possessed a recessive variant of the TAS2R38 gene which made some of them unable to taste PTC -- an inability they share with around one third of modern humans... Excavations since 2000 at the site at El Sidron, in the Asturias region, have so far recovered the skeletal remains of at least 10 Neanderthal individuals.

[SunkenCiv]

The Neandertal Enigma
by James Shreeve
in local libraries

Frayer's own reading of the record reveals a number of overlooked traits that clearly and specifically link the Neandertals to the Cro-Magnons. One such trait is the shape of the opening of the nerve canal in the lower jaw, a spot where dentists often give a pain-blocking injection. In many Neandertal, the upper portion of the opening is covered by a broad bony ridge, a curious feature also carried by a significant number of Cro-Magnons. But none of the alleged 'ancestors of us all' fossils from Africa have it, and it is extremely rare in modern people outside Europe." [pp 126-127]

[SunkenCiv]

· join list or digest · view topics · view or post blog · bookmark · post a topic ·
	Gods Graves Glyphs	To all -- please ping me to other topics which are appropriate for the GGG list. GGG managers are SunkenCiv, StayAt HomeMother, and Ernest_at_the_Beach
·Dogpile · Archaeologica · ArchaeoBlog · Archaeology · Biblical Archaeology Society · · Discover · Nat Geographic · Texas AM Anthro News · Yahoo Anthro & Archaeo · Google · · The Archaeology Channel · Excerpt, or Link only? · cgk's list of ping lists ·

[Bryanw92]

There’s a gene that makes me hate the taste of brussel sprouts? Cool!

[curmudgeonII]

Wonder if this is the same stuff that gives green peppers such a foul taste [at least to me and my kids]?

[djf]

Been some other studies I saw that basically said due to the cold climes, the huge energy demands of living a primarily hunting/stalking/tracking lifestyle, the neandertals generally ate somewhere between 7-10 thousand calories a day.

That means meat. Lots of meat!!

[SunkenCiv]

[SunkenCiv]

Could you repeat that? I couldn’t hear you over the meat sizzling on the grill. ;’)

[wendy1946]

The original diet of modern humans, as per Elaine Morgan, was probably some combination of fruit and shellfish. The original diet of Neanderthals was probably banannas and colobus monkeys as is still the case with chimpanzees.

[SunkenCiv]

Probably not, they’re not related. :’) Green (sweet bell) peppers are not yet ripe; red bell peppers are ripe. Green ones are much better after they’ve cooked (not unlike onions, they sweeten up). I’ll eat green peppers in stuff, or as the container for stuffed peppers, but while I like their look, I don’t care for them too much. :’)

[OldSpice]

Neanderthals Didn’t Mate With Modern Humans, Study Says

August 12, 2008

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2008/08/080812-neandertal-dna.html

The research further suggests that small population numbers helped do in our closest relatives.

Researchers sequenced the complete mitochondrial genome—genetic information passed down from mothers—of a 38,000-year-old Neanderthal thighbone found in a cave in Croatia. (Get the basics on genetics.)

The new sequence contains 16,565 DNA bases, or “letters,” representing 13 genes, making it the longest stretch of Neanderthal DNA ever examined.

Mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) is easier to isolate from ancient bones than conventional or “nuclear” DNA—which is contained in cell nuclei—because there are many mitochondria per cell.

“Also, the mtDNA genome is much smaller than the nuclear genome,” said study author Richard Green of the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Biology in Germany.

“That’s what let us finish this genome well before we finish the nuclear genome,” he said.

The new findings are detailed in the August 8 issue of the journal Cell.

EXCERPTED.

[billorites]

Gee, I dunno...
Guess I'll go with the monkey.

[djf]

Peppers consistently show up on lists of the worlds most nutritious foods.

http://www.brighthub.com/health/diet-nutrition/articles/42835.aspx

[Lurkina.n.Learnin]

“Neanderthals Didn’t Mate With Modern Humans, Study Says”

Please explain Howard Dean.

[SunkenCiv]

That’s obviously false, because regardless of where they are now cultivated, bananas are “native to the tropical region of Southeast Asia. Bananas are likely to have been first domesticated in Papua New Guinea.” Neandertal ate shellfish, seals, dolphins, in addition to mammoths and pretty much anything available to hunt. That list isn’t known to include colobus monkeys, which are native to parts of eastern Africa, and are unknown in Europe (including AFAI’ve ever seen, the fossil record in Europe), which comprises most of the known range of the Neandertal.

Neandertals were NOT misbegotten chimps.

[SunkenCiv]

There’s nothing about just one sample, taken from one individual, of mtDNA, that could possibly reveal anything about whether Neandertal and so-called modern humans mated.

[SunkenCiv]

D*mn those nutritionist busybodies!

[Lurkina.n.Learnin]

A freind of mine slices them into wedges, puts chesse on it and puts it on the gill until the chesse melts. yum

[OldSpice]

Molecular analysis of Neanderthal DNA from the northern Caucasus

http://cogweb.ucla.edu/Abstracts/Goodwin_00.html

“The expansion of premodern humans into western and eastern Europe 40,000 years before the present led to the eventual replacement of the Neanderthals by modern humans 28,000 years ago. Here we report the second mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) analysis of a Neanderthal, and the first such analysis on clearly dated Neanderthal remains. The specimen is from one of the eastern-most Neanderthal populations, recovered from Mezmaiskaya Cave in the northern Caucasus. Radiocarbon dating estimated the specimen to be 29,000 years old and therefore from one of the latest living Neanderthals. The sequence shows 3.48% divergence from the Feldhofer Neanderthal. Phylogenetic analysis places the two Neanderthals from the Caucasus and western Germany together in a clade that is distinct from modern humans, suggesting that their mtDNA types have not contributed to the modern human mtDNA pool. Comparison with modern populations provides no evidence for the multiregional hypothesis of modern human evolution.”

© Macmillan Publishers Ltd.

[djf]

Those guys ain’t true cavemen!!!
They’re mesozoic metrosexuals!!

Freakin whining all the time...

[Harmless Teddy Bear]

Green Peppers are Evil.

Actually it is the iron that tastes so bad.