Early Human Ancestor's Brain Didn't Grow Like Modern Humans'
The skull of an ancient human ancestor fails to show evidence of
the type of brain expansion typically seen in modern human infants, according
to a new study.
The "Taung child" fossil is known as the first and best
example of early brain evolution in hominins, the group containing humans
and their extinct relatives.
A recent study had suggested that features of the specimen allowed
the Taung child's brain to grow well into infancy, as occurs in modern
human children. But new brain scans of the Taung fossil show it lacks these
features, suggesting the postnatal brain growth seen in modern humans may not
have evolved until the rise of the Homospecies, states a new study
published today (Aug. 25) in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of
Sciences. The Homo species evolved about 2.5 million years ago
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