DNA study: Human-chimp split was messy (AP/CNN)

[eppur_se_muova]

Wednesday, May 17, 2006; Posted: 1:03 p.m. EDT (17:03 GMT)

NEW YORK (AP) -- Humans and chimps diverged from a single ancestral population through a complex process that took 4 million years, according to a new study comparing DNA from the two species.

By analyzing about 800 times more DNA than previous studies of the human-chimp split, researchers from the Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard were able to learn not just when, but a little bit about how the sister species arose.

"For the first time we're able to see the details written out in the DNA," said Eric Lander, founding director of the Broad Institute. "What they tell us at the least is that the human-chimp speciation was very unusual."

The researchers hypothesize that an ancestral ape species split into two isolated populations about 10 million years ago, then got back together after a few thousand millennia. At that time the two groups, though somewhat genetically different, would have mated to form a third, hybrid population. That population could have interbred with one or both of its parent populations. Then, at some point after 6.3 million years ago, two distinct lines arose.
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more: http://www.cnn.com/2006/TECH/science/05/17/human.chimp.split.ap/index.html

It promises to be messy the second time around, too.:evilfrown:

[kenny blankenship]

1. Damn chimps threw my clothes in the trash-stole my record collection too

I'll say it was messy. With breakups like this who needs divorce?

[AnneD]

2. Spray Alert...

oopps too late. :spray:

[moobu2]

3. Not very intelligent if you ask me..very interesting though

[hobbit709]

4. That explains bush

He's a genetic throwback.

[Field Of Dreams]

5. Such is the way when a President is forcibly removed from office.

eom

[politicat]

6. They definitely got the better end of the settlement.

Stronger, fewer back problems, none of the colo-rectal problems that being upright and having the entire weight of our internal organs pressing on a very small sphincter....

Of course, they have to put up with us....