HOW WE ALMOST BECAME TWO SPECIES

       #say cheese#   

Imagine you, humped back, practically naked except for a flimsy piece of animal skin or even leaves hanging loosely from your waist and a club hanging on your shoulder, living in a world with no electricity (just mean ‘ol fire). A world where Apples and Blackberries are just fruits and Tablets are stone slabs for making crude sketches. A world devoid of robots (Android), sleek cars (just your ever-dependable sturdy feet), toiletries (no toilet papers- Eeek!). A world where the only way to claim a chic (uhm! mate) is to slay vicious beasts before you are deemed worthy to profess your ‘oonga-boonga’ love to her. Sounds awesome uh? No? Well, according to gene studies, ancient humans almost started down the path of evolving into two separate species before merging back into a single population. Lucky for you that happened; your name would have been Yogi or worse- Shoonga, Grot or Ushmo (lol!!!).


According to scientists, genetic split in Africa resulted in distinct populations that lived in isolation for as much as 100,000 years (the longest modern human populations have been isolated from one another). To carry out their study, the researchers compiled a 'family tree' of different mitochondrial DNA groupings found in Africa and discovered that a major split occurred near the root of the tree giving rise to the different mitochondrial lineages predominant in the East and West and another predominant in Southern Africa.

Although there is a very deep divergence in the mitochondrial lineages that can be different from inferring when the populations diverged from one another, the scientists identify this as the most likely scenario that two populations went their separate ways early in our evolutionary history. This gave rise to separate human communities localized to eastern and southern Africa that evolved in isolation for between 50,000 and 100,000 years before merging to a single population. Though people still carry a signature of the ancient split in their DNA, today's Africans have been proven to be a part of a single population.....and I am mighty glad I can profess my love in English and type this  post on a super cool laptop #thumbs up#. 

*sighs* 'me love  Beyonce!'