How Did Neanderthal Brains Grow?
According to the results of the article, which are published in Science, both species regulate their growth differently to adapt their energy consumption to their physical characteristics.
“Discerning the differences and similarities in growth patterns between Neanderthals and modern humans helps us better define our own history. Modern humans and Neanderthals emerged from a common recent ancestor, and this is manifested in a similar overall growth rate”, explains CSIC researcher, Antonio Rosas, from Spain’s National Natural Science Museum (MNCN).
Skeleton of the Neanderthal boy recovered from the El Sidrón cave (Asturias, Spain).
Credit: Paleoanthropology Group MNCN-CSIC
“Developing a large brain involves significant energy expenditure and, consequently, this hinders the growth of other parts of the body. In sapiens, the development of the brain during childhood has a high energetic cost and, as a result, the development of the rest of the body slows down,” Rosas explains.
Neanderthals and sapiens
The cost, in terms of energy, of anatomical growth of the modern brain is unusually high, especially during breastfeeding and during infancy, and this seems to require a slowing down of body growth. The growth and development of this juvenile Neanderthal matches the typical characteristics of human ontogeny, where there is a slow anatomical growth between weaning and puberty. This could compensate for the immense energy cost of developing such a large brain.
(Left to right) Antonio García-Tabernero, Antonio Rosas and Luis Ríos beside the Neanderthal child’s skeleton.
Credit: Andrés Díaz-CSIC Communications Department
In fact, the skeleton and dentition of this Neanderthal present a physiology which is similar to that of a sapiens of the same age, except for the thorax area, which corresponds to a child between five and six years, in that it is less developed. “The growth of our Neanderthal child was not complete, probably due to energy saving”, explains CSIC researcher Antonio Rosas.
The only divergent aspect in the growth of both species is the moment of maturation of the vertebral column. In all hominids, the cartilaginous joints of the middle thoracic vertebrae and the atlas are the last to fuse, but in this Neanderthal, fusion occurred about two years later than in modern humans.
“The delay of this fusion in the vertebral column may indicate that Neanderthals had a decoupling of certain aspects in the transition from infancy to the juvenile phase. Although the implications are unknown, this feature could be related to the characteristic enlarged shape of the Neanderthal torso, or slower brain growth”, says Rosas.
The Neanderthal child
The protagonist of this study was 7.7 years old, weighed 26 kilos and measured 111 centimetres at the time of death. Although the genetic analyses failed to confirm the child’s sex, the canine teeth and the sturdiness of the bones showed that it to be a male. 138 pieces, 30 of them teeth (including some milk teeth), and part of the skeleton- including some fragments of the skull from the individual- identified as El Sidrón J1, have recovered.
The researchers have been able to establish that our protagonist was right-handed and was already performing adult tasks, such as using his teeth as a third hand to handle skins and plant fibres. In addition, they know who his mother was, and that the child protagonist of this investigation had a younger brother in the group. Furthermore, this child was found to have suffered from enamel hypoplasia when he was two or three years old. Hypoplasia (white spots on the teeth, especially visible in the upper incisors), occurs when the teeth have less enamel than normal, the cause usually being malnutrition or disease.
Discovered in 1994, the El Sidrón cave, located in Piloña (in Asturias, northern Spain) has provided the best collection of Neanderthals that exists on the Iberian Peninsula. The team has recovered the remains of 13 individuals from the cave. The group consisted of seven adults (four women and three men), three teenagers and three younger children.
Previous studies have been carried out by a multidisciplinary team led by the paleoanthropologist Antonio Rosas (CSIC’s National Museum of Natural Sciences), the geneticist Carles Lalueza-Fox (Institute of Evolutionary Biology, run by CSIC and the Pompeu Fabra University) and by the archaeologist Marco de la Rasilla (University of Oviedo).
Contacts and sources:
Ainhoa Goñi
Spanish National Research Council (CSIC)
Citation: The growth pattern of Neandertals, reconstructed from a juvenile skeleton from El Sidrón (Spain) Science 22 Sep 2017: Vol. 357, Issue 6357, pp. 1282-1287 DOI: 10.1126/science.aan6463 http://science.sciencemag.org/content/357/6357/1282
Source: http://www.ineffableisland.com/2017/09/how-did-neanderthal-brains-grow.html
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This is what happens when you believe the lie of evolution. You end up with countless theories but no facts or proof. It’s all an illusion. Even science puts the possibility of a living cell being formed from non living matter in the impossible range (1 to 1 with 40K zeroes after it). Yet evolutionists believe it happened. Just like finding a Ferrari in the jungle 500 years ago. Truth is God formed man from the dust of the earth, breathed into his nostrils the breath of life and man became a living being. At death the opposite happens. The body goes back to the dust it came from and the breath (spirit) goes back to God who gave it. Without the breath of God, no life can exist. More at http://www.itshisstory.com
They Are Not Like Us — by Jack Harper
Roughly 6 PERCENT of the WORLS’$ POPULATION CONSISTS of PEOPLE WITH NENDERTHAL GENES.
JEW$ FALL INTO THIS CATEGORY.
THIS IS WHY JEWS HAVE ALWAYS BEEN A PROBLEM:
because their Neanderthal genes make them twice as aggressive as the rest of the world’s Cro-Magnon derived races.
Edited and presented with pictures, captions, and an endnote by Lasha Darkmoon on the sexual proclivities of the JEWS.
“NEANDERTABLE” available on THE ORIGINAL ARTICLE linked.
“Basically, I estimate that about SEVENTY PERCENT of the present CRISIS on this PLANEt can be fairly ATTRIBUTED to the MACHINATIONS of NEANDERTHAL-SEMITIC ELEMENTS of human population against the Cro-Magnon majority.” — Michael Bradley, ESAU’$ EMPIRE.
Quite independent of Arthur Koestler, whose work he had never read, MICHAEL BRADLEY, a Canadian-based writer OF JEWISH ORIGIN, released his own 1978 work, THE ICEMAN INHERITANCE, followed up by its sequel, CHOSEN PEOPLE FROM the CAUCUSUS. In both these books, Bradley put forth his thesis that the modern day people known as the Jews were descendants from the Khazars and that, indeed…….
THE KHAZARS COULD TRACE THEIR ORIGINS BACK to NEANDERTHALS.
https://www.darkmoon.me/2014/they-are-not-like-us-by-jack-harper/