“Before the last glacial period, Neanderthals had diverse maternal lineages. As ice sheets advanced and habitable territory shrank, survivors appear to have concentrated in a climate refugium in ...

Currently, there are several hypotheses surrounding the disappearance of Neanderthals. While they all have at least some scientific support, researchers can't agree on which—or which combination—is ...

In the winter of 1829, Dutch-Belgian anthropologist Philippe-Charles Schmerling discovered a fossil in a cave in Engis, Belgium — what looked like the partial skull of a small child. Schmerling is ...

The basic outline of the interactions between modern humans and Neanderthals is now well established. The two came in contact as modern humans began their major expansion out of Africa, which occurred ...

Not every modern human has the same set of Neanderthal DNA, however; different people will, by chance, have inherited different fragments. But there are also some areas, termed “Neanderthal deserts,” ...

When ancient humans interbred, new research shows that the pairings were predominantly male Neanderthals and female Homo sapiens. Reconstruction of a Neanderthal man (Homo neanderthalensis), based on ...