

The Case of the Missing Human Ancestor - darkchyld
http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/2013/07/125-missing-human-ancestor/shreeve-text

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lupatus
Left-out of this article is that the Denisovans seem to be one of the
ancestors of the Melanesian peoples living in and near Papua New Guinea:
[http://johnhawks.net/weblog/reviews/neandertals/neandertal_d...](http://johnhawks.net/weblog/reviews/neandertals/neandertal_dna/denisova-
nuclear-genome-reich-2010.html).

More about the Melanesians:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Melanesians](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Melanesians)

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jnbiche
He mentioned it briefly, along with Australian Aborigines as well as a
population from the Philippines who displays a notable share of Denisovan DNA
(around 2.5%, versus ~5% in the Melanesians).

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lupatus
I must have missed that. Thanks!

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RexRollman
When articles like this talk about interbreeding, I can't help but wonder how
that happened. At the time, were we close enough to them in appearance that it
would have happened willingly, or are we talking about rape scenarios?

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BerislavLopac
I don't think appearance has a lot to do about that...

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RexRollman
If they looked really different, or were really different in some other way,
than I could see them being ostracized. Of course, it is also possible that
primitive man couldn't tell the difference between themselves and the others.

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pcrh
I hope for the day when a bone or whatever is found that contains something
like 25-50% human and 25-50% Denisovan or Neanderthal... The frozen expanses
of Siberia seem to be a good place to look for them...

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userulluipeste
I wonder when we'll be able to simulate an organism out of a given sequenced
DNA. It may be a little too much to recreate a real living thing, but I think
it would be OK to simulate.

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bionerd
Well, the DNA itself probably wouldn't be enough because it doesn't really
encode an algorithm or recipe describing how a (multicellular in this context)
living organism is constructed from it's genetic information. Instead, the DNA
is more like a huge collection of building blocks. But how and what will be
constructed from this pile (meaning what will be included in the final system
and what won't) that's a completely different matter.

A few links for the interested:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Developmental_biology](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Developmental_biology)
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Epigenetics](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Epigenetics)

That said, there has been quite an exciting paper published around a year ago
describing the first simulation of one life cycle of an _in silico_ Mycoplasma
genitalium (the smallest known bacteria). Here's a link to relevant HN
discussion:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4272039](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4272039)

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gizmo686
For simple organisms, we could probably consider what would happen if we put
their DNA in the nucleas, letting it be transcribed by the 'standard' process.
This is exactly what viruses do when they inject their DNA/RNA into a foreign
cell so they will be cloned.

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Gravityloss
The article is inconsistent. There is one morphological clue from the
Denisovans that could be used to match the Chinese skulls - the huge size of
the tooth.

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k__
I hope it's the pig-chimp!

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jonsen
Nosy

