I had suspected this for some time, ever since it was established that Neandertal man carried the red haired gene, which is very old, going back to before our ancestors are suposed to have left Africa and it is highly unlikely that red haired people would have evolved in Africa.
A genetic study released today shows that people of European, Asian and Australasian origin all have Neandertal DNA but not Africans.
The study was lead by Svante Paabo of the Max Planck Institute in Munich, Germany. Paabo says that all of us outside of Africa have a little Neandertal DNA in us.
Dr David Reich of the Harvard Medical school, who participated in the study, confirmed that Neandertal inherited genetic material is a small but very real proportion of ancestry in all non Africans today.
It feels good to be proven right
