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Neanderthals became extinct around 40,000 years ago. Hypotheses on the causes of the extinction include violence, transmission of diseases from modern humans which Neanderthals had no immunity to, competitive replacement, extinction by interbreeding with early modern human populations, natural catastrophes, climate change and inbreeding depression.
Those first modern humans that had interbred with Neanderthals and lived alongside them died out completely in Europe 40,000 years ago - but not before their offspring had spread further out into ...
The study found that humans left Africa, encountered and interbred with Neanderthals in three waves: One about 200,000 to 250,000 years ago, not long after the very first Homo sapiens fossils ...
Conversely, significant rates of modern human gene flow into Neanderthals occurred—of the three examined lineages—for only the Altai Neanderthal (0.1–2.1%), suggesting that modern human gene flow into Neanderthals mainly took place after the separation of the Altai Neanderthals from the El Sidrón and Vindija Neanderthals that occurred ...
Compared with modern humans, Neanderthals had a more robust build and proportionally shorter limbs. Researchers often explain these features as adaptations to conserve heat in a cold climate; however, they may also have been adaptations for sprinting in the warmer, forested landscape that Neanderthals often inhabited. [25]
The Neanderthal DNA found in modern human genomes has long raised questions about ancient interbreeding. New studies offer a timeline of when that occurred and when ancient humans left Africa.
Since modern human/Neanderthal admixture is known to have occurred in the Middle East, and no modern body louse species descends from their Neanderthal counterparts (body lice only inhabit clothed individuals), it is possible Neanderthals (and/or modern humans) in hotter climates did not wear clothes, or Neanderthal lice were highly specialised.
Recent fossil evidence indicates modern humans (Homo sapiens) and Neanderthals (Homo neanderthalensis) may have co-existed in Europe for as long as 5,000 to 6,000 years before Neanderthals became ...