When did the first humans start speaking? Did we always have this ability, inherited from our immediate ancestors? These questions sound impossible to answer — but not quite so. A new study, drawing ...
A new study links a particular gene and a protein variant found only in humans to the origins of spoken language. Researchers used CRISPR gene editing to replace the NOVA1 protein found in mice with ...
Last Word is New Scientist’s long-running series in which readers give scientific answers to each other’s questions, ranging from the minutiae of everyday life to absurd astronomical hypotheticals. To ...
Last Word is New Scientist’s long-running series in which readers give scientific answers to each other’s questions, ranging from the minutiae of everyday life to absurd astronomical hypotheticals. To ...
Mice carrying a gene variant present in nearly every human on Earth — but not in extinct relatives including Neanderthals — produce more-complex chirps than normal rodents do 1. The finding suggests ...