It is now well established that as modern humans migrated out of Africa , we matte with the Neanderthals already present in the Middle East and shared a few of our factor . But it was n’t only our factor that we shared . We also managed to depart a few , shall we say , more distasteful leave-taking gifts , inthe manikin of sexually transmitted infection .
Most sexually active the great unwashed around the world will at some dot be infect by the human papilloma virus , and some will be repeatedly taint . There are over 100 unlike eccentric of HPV , most of which are benignant and relatively harmless , but there are at least a dozen strain of the virus that have been connect to more serious conditions , such as cervical and unwritten cancers .
Thetwo main culpritsfor this are HPV16 and HPV18 , which together cause the vast majority of HPV - induced Cancer . It now seems that we may have been swapping HPV16 with Neanderthals when we started interbreeding tens of one thousand of years ago . Research , publish in the journalMolecular Biology and Evolution , has managed to delineate the blood line and timing of the HPV16 family Sir Herbert Beerbohm Tree in more point than ever before , and what they found was fascinating .
It seems that the computer virus was already infect our humanoid ancestors before we split into the separate linages that yield rise to modern world on one side , and Neanderthals and Denisovan on the other . The HPV16 then appear to have acquire in sync with these two branches of our own family Sir Herbert Beerbohm Tree , the two reach themselves diverge to organize the A variant that infect Neanderthals , and the B / C / five hundred variant that infect modern mankind .
That is until the two human metal money met between 60,000 and100,000 geezerhood agowhen modern humans started their heroic journey around the globe . At this point , it appears that man became infected with the HPV16 A variation , and then took it with them as they migrated . This fits almost perfectly with the fact that while the HPV16 A variant is almost non - existent in sub - Saharan Africa , as the modern human ancestors from these regions did n’t do the dirty with Neanderthals , the diversity of HPV is at its groovy within East Asia , where both species are well known to have been mating with each other .
“ Oncogenic [ tumor causation ] viruses are very ancient . The history of homo is also the chronicle of the computer virus we carry and we inherit,”explainsIgnacio Bravo , who co - author the paper . “ Our body of work suggests that some aggressive oncogenic viruses were transmitted by sexual striking from antiquated to forward-looking humans . ” So it seems that we may all be a slight closer to the Neanderthals then we thought before .
