Eve

 

 

 

 Mitochondrial Eve was someone who contributed a vital cell component – the DNA of the mitochondria – to all of her children, who then passed it to everyone in future generations.

She lived in sub-Saharan Africa about approximately 170,000 years ago, about the time period when Homo sapiens split off from other Homo genus groups.

 

Ghana Woman

                                                                     Ethiopian Woman

                                                                         Japanese Woman

                                                                      Brazilian Women

                                                                          aboriginal child

 

 

 

Amphioxus

http://www.scienceinschool.org/2010/issue14/amphioxus

Since Charles Darwin’s view on natural selection and evolution, scientists have considered amphioxus to be an essential organism for understanding the origin of the vertebrates.

Amphioxus is part of a small group of creatures that Darwin characterized as ‘living fossils’ – species that are alive today but still are incredibly similar to their ancient fossilised ancestors – which are valuabe to scientists studying evolution and devolution.  Even though it may appear that these organisms have been trapped in an evolutionary time warp, in fact their DNA has been exposed to as many mutations as that of any other organism.