![](https://www.rickilewis.com/rails/active_storage/representations/redirect/eyJfcmFpbHMiOnsibWVzc2FnZSI6IkJBaHBBOWxlQVE9PSIsImV4cCI6bnVsbCwicHVyIjoiYmxvYl9pZCJ9fQ==--504940c6234b7cc0fb1b1ef1d3bb5116cbb0078c/eyJfcmFpbHMiOnsibWVzc2FnZSI6IkJBaDdCem9MWm05eWJXRjBTU0lJYW5CbkJqb0dSVlE2RkhKbGMybDZaVjkwYjE5c2FXMXBkRnNIYVFMZ0FXa0M0QUU9IiwiZXhwIjpudWxsLCJwdXIiOiJ2YXJpYXRpb24ifX0=--d00c0b801be2eac628730b2b4ffb891cbdd69dfe/svante_paabo.jpg)
A Neandertal and Svante Pääbo, director of the Department of Evolutionary Genetics at the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology (photo credit)
As a textbook author, I often have to evaluate new research and predict whether it will stand the test of time. I’m a skeptic. But when Svante Pääbo, director of the Department of Evolutionary Genetics at the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology in Leipzig and his colleagues introduced a new member of the human family in 2010 based on a preliminary genome sequence from a finger bone found in Denisova Cave in the Altai Mountains of southern Siberia, with few other clues, I included her in my book. She was the first discovered Denisovan (pronounced “Denise-o-van”). Read More