'Junk DNA' Defines Differences Between Humans and Primates. Scientists believed for years that the vast phenotypic differences between humans and chimpanzees would display significantly different genetic makeups. However, when their genomes were later sequenced, researchers were surprised to learn that the DNA sequences of human and chimpanzee genes are nearly identical. In molecular biology, "junk" DNA is a collective label for the portions of the DNA sequence of a chromosome or a genome for which no function has yet been identified.
About 98.5% of the human genome has been designated as "junk", including most sequences within introns and most intergenic DNA. While much of this sequence is probably an evolutionary artifact that serves no present-day purpose, some may function in ways that are not currently understood. What then is responsible for the many morphological and behavioral differences between the two species? The Daily Galaxy via Georgia Institute of Technology. Preening the History of Primates | Wired Science. A close-up of Smilodectes, a lemur-like primate closely related to Notharctus. Photo by the author. When viewed within the broader context of our evolutionary history, we are anthropoid primates. That’s the group which contains monkeys and apes (with our species being a specialized variety of ape, and apes being a particular subset of monkeys, and monkeys representing the major group of anthropoids). But how anthropoid primates originated has been a subject of frequent contention.
The current consensus – on the basis of anatomy, genetics, and other lines of evidence – is that anthropoids are most closely related to tarsiers and extinct, tarsier-like primates called omomyiforms. A simplified diagram of primate evolutionary relationships. Then Ida crashed the party. But the mess had at least one positive outcome. Notharctus tenebrosus is a classic fossil primate. One of primary facets of the Darwinius debate has been whether or not the lemur-like primate had a grooming claw. References: BMC Evolutionary Biology | Abstract | Social learning of vocal structure in a nonhuman primate? Eol. Biology Bonobos are highly intelligent, social animals. They live in stable communities that may have up to 150 members, although these will usually split into smaller groups in order to forage or travel (2). Swellings on the rump advertise a female's receptivity to mating; there is no specific breeding season (5). A single offspring is born after around 8 months of gestation and will be cared for by its mother for almost 5 years (6).
Trusted. News Video. The Last Great Ape. The Last Great Ape | Kanzi the Bonobo. The Last Great Ape | Kanzi the Bonobo. The Last Great Ape | Kanzi the Bonobo (Flash) Jane Goodall: What Separates Us From the Apes « The TEDxClassroomProject. In TED Talks on May 20, 2010 at 9:38 pm Reflection by KEITH C. Original TED page w/ speaker bio, links, comments, etc: Jane Goodall: What Separates Us From the Apes Jane starts off her talk with explaining how she actually had come to the ted conference directly from deep inside the rainforest of Ecuador. This in itself is very interesting to me, a woman of her age with the desire to go places like that. She also explained how she met up with people that had paint on their faces and feather in their headdresses. Later on in the video, Jane also talks about how this new technology is being used to educate nonhuman animals such as chimpanzees.
Like this: Like Loading... Jane Goodall on what separates us from the apes. Speaking Bonobo. To better understand bonobo intelligence, I traveled to Des Moines, Iowa, to meet Kanzi, a 26-year-old male bonobo reputedly able to converse with humans. When Kanzi was an infant, American psychologist Sue Savage-Rumbaugh tried to teach his mother, Matata, to communicate using a keyboard labeled with geometric symbols. Matata never really got the hang of it, but Kanzi—who usually played in the background, seemingly oblivious, during his mother’s teaching sessions—picked up the language. Savage-Rumbaugh and her colleagues kept adding symbols to Kanzi’s keyboard and laminated sheets of paper. First Kanzi used 6 symbols, then 18, finally 348. The symbols refer to familiar objects (yogurt, key, tummy, bowl), favored activities (chase, tickle), and even some concepts considered fairly abstract (now, bad).
Kanzi learned to combine these symbols in regular ways, or in what linguists call"proto-grammar. " Through a glass panel, Savage-Rumbaugh asks Kanzi if it’s OK for me to enter his enclosure. "