The orangutan genome has been sequenced by an international research project including scientists from Catalonia. In an article published in Nature, the researchers say there is a 97% genetic overlap between the orangutan and the human genomes

STAFF | JANUARY 28th, 2011

The analysis of the genome of an extinct hominid in Siberia and the morphology of a tooth of another individual now suggest that this is a new hominid population different from the Neanderthals and Homo sapiens

STAFF | DECEMBER 23RD, 2010

Researchers from the Catalan Institute of Paleontology have identified a new species of primate, Pseudoloris pyrenaicus, from the fossil remains of a nearly complete set of teeth found at the Sant Jaume de Frontanyà site in Berguedà, Spain. The discovery has led to a rough draft of the first evolutionary lineage in the Pseudoloris genus.

STAFF | OCTOBER 26TH, 2010

After analyzing data from nearly 500 species of mammals, researchers at the Center for Ecological Research and Forestry Applications (CREAF) have concluded that mammals with large brains in relation to body size tend to live longer.

STAFF | AUGUST 16th, 2010

Reconstructing the natural history of a living organism is above all a question of time and resources, experts say. The use of molecular technologies not only complements the contribution from the fossil record but is increasingly replacing it and thereby reduces the margin of error to “practically zero”. The investigation of the malaria plasmodium is one of the best examples.

XAVIER PUJOL GEBELLÍ | JULY 30, 2010

The Neanderthal jaw that University of Barcelona (UB) archaeologists Montserrat Sanz and Joan Daura found in Sitges in 2005, popularly known as the “Jaws of Sitges,” have been dated as much older than originally thought, a full 53,200 years old, thanks to a new uranium-thorium system developed at the University of Bristol, where Daura is currently carrying out research.

11 june 2010

The Astronomical Association of Osona will hold the conference “Evolució molecular en humans” (“Molecular Evolution in Humans”) by Josep M. Serrat, of the University of Vic, on Tuesday, June 8.

7 june 2010

A new study comparing the human genome with the genomes of other vertebrate species to determine which of the repetitive motifs found in human proteins are important for the proper functioning of the body and which could correspond to the so-called “junk” fraction of the genome has just been published in the online journal Genome Research. The study was carried out entirely by the research group in Evolutionary Genomics, within the Computational Genomics group of GRIB at the University of Pompeu Fabra in Barcelona and was led by Mar Albà, ICREA researcher.

4 june 2010

Last year, a team of scientists announced that Ardi, a pre-human fossils dating back 4.4 million years ago, had lived in a wooded area, an idea that was revolutionary because it contradicted previous theories. However, according to new findings from another team of scientists who examined the exact same data, the environment of the first bipedal primates was more likely a savannah.

Staff | 28 may 2010

All the way from prehistory to the very end of the species, two experts on human evolution, Salvador Moya-Sola, director of the Paleontology Institute of Catalonia (ICP), and Eudald Carbonell, director of the Institute of Human Paleontology and Cultural Evolution (IPHES) shared, in respective lectures, the considerations that build the foundations of their research.

Ànnia Monreal | 24 MAY 2010

Almost 100 years ago Edwin Hubble observed that distant galaxies are moving away from Earth faster than those that are closer. This relationship between distance and velocity is widely cited as evidence of the origin of the Universe from a Big Bang. Researchers at the Centre for Genomic Regulation copied his approach to investigate the divergence between protein sequences.

20 may 2010

A new species of small fossil primate was presented to the scientific community. These beings lived on the Iberian Peninsula around 39 million years ago, and were similar to modern lemurs, which nowadays are found only in the island of Madagascar. The new genus and species discovered belongs to the Family ‘Notharctidae’ (‘Infraorder Adapiformes’).

17 may 2010

The lives of the naturalist Georges Cuvier, the father of comparative anatomy, and of the philosopher Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel shared several similarities. Contemporaries, both men were born and died almost at the exact same time, they enjoyed mutual friends, were subjects of the same state of the old regime (Württemberg), and suffered from unpopularity for reasons often having nothing at all to do with science. These coincidences and their common battle with the German school of Naturphilosophie, convinced me to construct an intertwined biography of both men, recovering the old structure of parallel lives.

13 may 2010

Adrià Casinos, History of Science

Tomorrow, Thursday, May 6, Eudald Carbonell will hold the conference entitled “Evolution and design” at 19:00 at the CosmoCaixa Science Museum in Barcelona. Author of the book “Social Sex” and director of the Catalan Institute of Human Palaeoecology and Social Evolution (IPHES), Carbonell will discuss how technological development helps to investigate the causes and development of both natural and cultural evolution.

4 may 2010

Scientists revive the mammoth’s hemoglobin

Staff | 3 may 2010