Who our Ancestors and Modern Relatives?

Ancestors

    Australopithecus

    Homo erectus

    Neanderthals

Modern Relatives

    Chimpanzees

    Gorilla

    Orangutans

    Baboons

    Howler monkeys

“Keep steadily in mind that each organic being is striving to increase...that each at some period of its life.... has to struggle for life, and suffer great destruction....The war of nature is not incessant... the vigorous, the healthy, and the happy survive and multiply.”

Charles Darwin

Charles Darwin

Charles Darwin was the scientist who established the theory of evolution by natural selection. He showed all living things can be traced back to a common ancestor.  Change occurs slowly over time and the traits that help an individual survive are the ones that get passed down from parents to offspring.

Modern Relatives

    1.Chimpanzees are our closest modern relatives.

    2. Humans and chimpanzees share a common ancestor that lived 78,000,000 years ago

Chimpanzees and Humans share about 98-99% of the same DNA. Our common ancestor lived about 78 million years ago. As you can see our next closest living relatives are the Gorillas, Orangutans, Old world monkeys and lastly, New world monkeys.

Genetics and DNA

    The more closely things are related, the more similar the order and sequence of their DNA bases. This is because they got their DNA from the same ancestors. All living things have DNA. DNA is made up of 4 bases repeated in a unique order. Scientists who study Genetics and DNA have compared Human and Chimps DNA and found that most of it is the same. This is because we come from a common ancestor. Just like you got your DNA from your parents, Grandparents and Great Grandparents, Humans and chimpanzees got their DNA from a common ancestor 78 million years ago.

Ancestors

Our closest family relative are the Neanderthals All of our Ancestors went extinct but the descendants of those ancestors kept the best characteristics such as bigger brains, stronger legs for running better hunting strategies and social connections