Homo Neanderthals

research on homo neanderthals
Homo neanderthals * Species restricted to Europe, eastern Middle East during height of Ice Age * Evolved to be specifically cold-adapted: * Short and stocky body type * Large nose (nasal passages for warming air) * Barrel chest (also for warming air) * Long, low, thick skull but with large cranial capacity (close to modern humans) * Heavy brow ridge

* Neanderthals' teeth developed faster than their human cousins, new research has revealed. * This may mean Neanderthals reached maturity at 15 years old, around three years earlier than our early human ancestors.
Kebara 2 Skeleton (“Moshe”) * The archaeological evidence seems to indicate that Moshe was indeed buried. * He had been placed on his back in a shallow pit with his right arm placed across his chest and his left arm across his abdomen. * Study of the skeleton suggests that Moshe was between the ages of 25 and 35 when he died.
His death was apparently a result of natural causes as there is no evidence of violence or disease in his bones. Moshe was about 1.7 meters tall - a height that is taller than the average European Neanderthal
Neanderthal language * The most important part of this find, however, may be the fact that along with all of the other bones, a complete hyoid bone was found. * Whether or not Neanderthals possessed the ability to speak is a question that incites more furious debates than those on Neanderthal burials.
This hyoid bone is identical to ours, thus suggesting that the Neanderthals shared our capacity for language

Features: * Elaborate Stone and Bone Tool technology * Mousterian tools * First to bury dead * Some degree of altruism * Old Man of La Chapelle * Individual from Shanidar
Old Man of La Chapelle * The Old Man of La Chapelle, who dates to about 50,000 years ago, suffered from severe arthritis in his neck, had a deformed left hip, a crushed toe, a broken rib, and damaged patella.
The fact that despite all of these ailments, this individual was able to survive indicates that he was cared for by other members of his cl mtDNA * Genetic evidence from a comparison of human and Neanderthal mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) shows that while chimpanzee and human lineages diverged over five million years ago, the Neanderthals diverged from humans over 550,000 to 690,000 years ago. * Bones of Homo antecessor , recovered from the Gran Dolina site, in the Sierra de Atapuerca (Burgos, Spain) have been dated at about 780,000 old and are said to represent the last common ancestor for H. sapiens (modern humans) and H. neanderthalensis (Neanderthals)
What happened to them? * A study in Nature magazine suggests the species may have lived in Gorham's Cave on Gibraltar up to 24,000 years ago. * The Neanderthal people were believed to have died out about 35,000 years ago, at a time when modern humans were advancing across the continent.
The new evidence suggests they held on in Europe's deep south long after the arrival of Homo sapie