Neanderthals, which disappeared from the archaeological record roughly 40,000 years ago, have long been considered our closest evolutionary relatives. But almost since the first discovery of Neanderthal remains in the 1800s, scientists have been arguing over whether Neanderthals constitute their own species or if they're simply a subset of our own species, Homo sapiens, that has since gone extinct.

So what does the science say? In particular, what does the genetic evidence, which didn't exist back when many early hominins were first discovered, show?

A little-known dog lineage with fur so thick it was spun into blankets was selectively bred for millennia by Native Americans of the Pacific Northwest until its rapid demise following European colonization, a study in Science showed Thursday.

The new research was based on a genetic analysis of "Mutton," one of the last surviving Coast Salish woolly dogs whose pelt was sent to the nascent Smithsonian Institution in 1859, only to be largely forgotten until the early 2000s.

Interviews contributed by Coast Salish tribal co-authors, meanwhile, revealed the dogs occupied a previously underappreciated high-status in Indigenous societies, which revered the animals as members of the family and adorned their most treasured items with their emblem.

Bastards

A new research paper finds that genetic material from Neanderthal ancestors may have contributed to the propensity of some people today to be "early risers," the sort of people who are more comfortable getting up and going to bed earlier.

The findings are published in the journal Genome Biology and Evolution.

The species lived in the Middle Pleistocene, an era that took place 774,000 to 129,000 years ago. The Homo bodoensis is thought to be the most direct ancestor of humans.

Human ancestors in Africa were pushed to the brink of extinction around 900,000 years ago, a study shows. The work, published in Science, suggests a drastic reduction in the population of our ancestors well before our species, Homo sapiens, emerged. The population of breeding individuals was reduced to just 1,280 and didn’t expand again for another 117,000 years.

"The kurgan (burial mound) investigated was the grave of six brothers, their wives, children and grandchildren. The presumably oldest brother had eight children with two wives, one of whom came from the Asian steppe regions in the east. The other brothers showed no signs of polygamy and probably lived monogamously with far fewer children."