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Why apes can't talk: our study suggests they've got the voice but not the brains

- October 10, 2018

We all know that parrots can talk . Some people may have even seen elephants , seals , or whales mimicking speech sounds. So why can’t our closest primate relatives speak like us? Our new research suggests they have the right vocal anatomy but not the brainpower to use it. Scientists have been interested in understanding this phenomenon for centuries. Some have argued that non-human primates didn’t have the right-shaped body parts to make the same sounds as we do, and that human speech evolved after our speech organs changed. But comparative studies have shown that the form and function of the larynx and vocal tract is very similar across most primates species , including humans. This suggests that the primate vocal tract is “ speech ready ” but that most species don’t have the neural control to make the complex sounds that comprise human speech. When reviewing the evidence in 1871, Charles Darwin wrote “the brain has no doubt been far more important”. Along with Jeroe

Indigenous people invented the so-called 'American Dream'

- October 10, 2018

When President Barack Obama created Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, the 2012 program that offered undocumented young people brought to the U.S. as children a path into society , for a moment the ideals of the American Dream seemed, at least for this group, real. We call these kids, many of whom are now adults, “ Dreamers ,” because they are chasing the American Dream – a national aspiration for upward economic mobility built on physical mobility . Fulfilling your dreams often means following them wherever they may lead – even into another country. The Trump administration’s decision to cancel DACA – which is currently on hold while it is litigated in the courts – and build a U.S.-Mexico border wall has endangered those dreams by subjecting 800,000 young people to deportation. But the notion underlying both Trump’s DACA repeal and the wall – which is that “ illegal ” immigrants, most of them from Mexico, are stealing U.S. jobs and hurting society – reflects a pro

Ancient African herders had lasting ecological impact on grazed lands

- September 11, 2018

Ancient animal herders added to the ecological richness and diversity of the African savanna thousands of years ago -- an effect that persists to the present day, a new study finds. The herders' practice of penning their cattle, goats and sheep at night created nutrient-rich grassy glades, called hotspots, that still attract wildlife and have increased habitat diversity in the region, researchers report in the journal Nature. Typically, the African savanna is scrubby, with small trees and shrubs and lots of bare soil, said University of Illinois anthropology professor Stanley Ambrose, who led the new research with Fiona Marshall of Washington University in St. Louis. The herding hotspots appear on the landscape today as dense, grassy areas several acres in diameter, he said. "When Stone Age herders came to eastern Africa 3,500 years ago, they changed vegetation patterns for the better, rather than degrading the savanna, as is often believed," Ambrose said. &q

99-million-year-old beetle trapped in amber served as pollinator to evergreen cycads

- September 11, 2018

Flowering plants are well known for their special relationship to the insects and other animals that serve as their pollinators. But, before the rise of angiosperms, another group of unusual evergreen gymnosperms, known as cycads, may have been the first insect-pollinated plants. Now, researchers reporting in the journal Current Biology on August 16 have uncovered the earliest definitive fossil evidence of that intimate relationship between cycads and insects. The discovery came in the form of an ancient boganiid beetle preserved in Burmese amber for an estimated 99 million years along with grains of cycad pollen. The beetle also shows special adaptations, including mandibular patches, for the transport of cycad pollen. "Boganiid beetles have been ancient pollinators for cycads since the Age of Cycads and Dinosaurs," says Chenyang Cai, now a research fellow at the University of Bristol. "Our find indicates a probable ancient origin of beetle pollination of

Cranium of a four-million-year-old hominin shows similarities to that of modern humans

- August 01, 2018

A cranium of a four-million-year-old fossil, that, in 1995 was described as the oldest evidence of human evolution in South Africa, has shown similarities to that of our own, when scanned through high resolution imaging systems. The cranium of the extinct Australopithecus genus was found in the lower-lying deposits of the Jacovec Cavern in the Sterkfontein Caves, about 40km North-West of Johannesburg in South Africa. Dr Amelie Beaudet from the School of Geography, Archaeology and Environmental Studies of the University of the Witwatersrand and her colleagues from the Sterkfontein team scanned the cranium at the Evolutionary Studies Institute, based at the University of the Witwatersrand, in 2016 and applied advanced imaging techniques in "virtual paleontology" to further explore the anatomy of the cranium. Their research was funded by the Centre of Excellence in Palaeosciences, the Claude Leon Foundation and the French Institute of South Africa and was published i

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