Sunlight changes Many scientists have believed that lighter skin gradually arose in Europeans starting around 40,000 years ago, soon after people left tropical Africa for Europe's higher latitudes.
The first humans to leave Africa 40,000 years ago are believed to have had dark skin, which would have been advantageous in sunny climates. But humans did not uniformly develop light skin when they reached the colder regions of Europe.
Some researchers suggest that human populations over the past 50,000 years have changed from dark-skinned to light-skinned and vice versa as they migrated to different UV zones, and that such major changes in pigmentation may have happened in as little as 100 generations (≈2,500 years) through selective sweeps.
People developed writing to communicate across time and space, carrying it with them as they traded, migrated and conquered. From its first uses for counting and naming things and communicating beyond the grave, humans have altered and enriched writing to reflect their complicated needs and desires.
The evolution of dark skin is believed to have begun around 1.2 million years ago, in light-skinned early hominid species after they moved from the equatorial rainforest to the sunny savannas.
As people moved to areas farther from the equator with lower UV levels, natural selection favored lighter skin which allowed UV rays to penetrate and produce essential vitamin D. The darker skin of peoples who lived closer to the equator was important in preventing folate deficiency.
Researches at Penn State University identified SLC24A5 as the gene responsible for skin pigmentation, and a specific mutation within it responsible for fair skin. The mutation, A111T, is found most commonly in Ireland and all who possess it share a common genetic code descended from the same ONE person.
According to researchers at Penn State University, translucent Irish can thank a genetic code inherited from a single person around 10,000 years ago. A native of either India or the Middle East, carrying the skin pigmentation gene logged as SLC24A5, passed it to the people of Ireland through his ancestors.
“The vast majority of the ethnically-Irish population have skin type 1-2. People in this category have pale skin that burns easily and poorly tans.
I wanted to test skin color separately to find out whether it's important to perceptions of beauty. I found that without regard to physical features, people prefer light brown skin over dark brown skin or pale skin,” said Frisby, associate professor of strategic communication at the School.
Humans first evolved in Africa, and much of human evolution occurred on that continent. The fossils of early humans who lived between 6 and 2 million years ago come entirely from Africa. Most scientists currently recognize some 15 to 20 different species of early humans.
Until recently, researchers assumed that after human ancestors shed most body hair, sometime before 2 million years ago, they quickly evolved dark skin for protection from skin cancer and other harmful effects of UV radiation.
Many scientists have believed that lighter skin gradually arose in Europeans starting around 40,000 years ago, soon after people left tropical Africa for Europe's higher latitudes.
They found the Stone Age Briton had dark hair - with a small probability that it was curlier than average - blue eyes and skin that was probably dark brown or black in tone. This combination might appear striking to us today, but it was a common appearance in western Europe during this period.
Africans have more genetic variation than anyone else on Earth, according to a new study that helps narrow the location where humans first evolved, probably near the South Africa-Namibia border.
Researchers have long debated when humans starting talking to each other. Estimates range wildly, from as late as 50,000 years ago to as early as the beginning of the human genus more than 2 million years ago.
Humans began to develop systems of reading and writing only within the past few thousand years. Our reading abilities set us apart from other animal species, but a few thousand years is much too short a timeframe for our brains to have evolved new areas specifically devoted to reading.
If your body makes too little melanin, your skin gets lighter. Vitiligo is a condition that causes patches of light skin. Albinism is a genetic condition affecting a person's skin. A person with albinism may have no color, lighter than normal skin color, or patchy missing skin color.
It seems that the Negroid and the Caucasoid-Mongoloid groups diverged about 110,000 +/- 34,000 years ago, whereas Caucasoid and Mongoloid diverged about 41,000 +/- 15,000 years ago. The genetic relationships of various races in each group of Caucasoid, Negroid, and Mongoloid were also studied.
Common Questions about Mitochondrial Eve
Mitochondrial Eve is the female ancestor of all human beings. The reason is that the mitochondrial DNA passes on only though mothers to children, and the father has no role in it.
Now genetic research has revealed that ancient European populations were dark skinned for far longer than had originally been thought. Rather than lightening as early humans migrated north from Africa around 40,000 years ago due to lower levels of sunlight, these first Homo sapiens retained their dark skin colour.
The rarest skin color in the world is believed to be the white from albinism, a genetic mutation that causes a lack of melanin production in the human body. Albinism affects 1 in every 3,000 to 20,000 people. What is this? People with albinism usually have very pale or colorless skin, hair, and eyes.
These early humans probably had pale skin, much like humans' closest living relative, the chimpanzee, which is white under its fur. Around 1.2 million to 1.8 million years ago, early Homo sapiens evolved dark skin. But evolutionary biologists haven't been convinced that skin cancer itself drove the evolutionary change.
Homo erectus characteristics
H. erectus is the oldest known species to have a human-like body, with relatively elongated legs and shorter arms in comparison to its torso. It had an upright posture.
Type I – White skin color, blonde hair, and green eyes, always burns in the sun, has freckles. Common ethnic background: English, Scottish.