Ancient DNA is turning human prehistory into something startlingly intimate. Instead of a clean handoff from one species to another, the last 50,000 years look more like a long, tangled story of ...

For instance, it has been argued that as the modern human Y chromosome replaced the Neanderthal equivalent, Neanderthal males became sterile. Other research suggests that human genes might have messed ...

When scientists sequenced the Neanderthal genome in 2010, they learned that Neanderthals interbred with human ancestors before mysteriously going extinct. As a result, many people alive today share up ...

If you enjoyed this article, I’d like to ask for your support. Scientific American has served as an advocate for science and industry for 180 years, and right now may be the most critical moment in ...

When you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission. Here’s how it works. When scientists sequenced the Neanderthal genome in 2010, they learned that Neanderthals ...