Rapidly Evolving Human Genomic Region Tied to Neural Development, Flexible Thinking

Rapidly Evolving Human Genomic Region Tied to Neural Development, Flexible Thinking

Human-accelerated regions (HARs) are sections of the human genome that have accumulated an unusually high level of mutations as humans split away from chimpanzees. Given their rapid evolution, some scientists hypothesize that these sequences have an essential role in conferring human-specific traits. But that conclusion is not based on evolution alone. “My personal opinion is that more than half our genome is junk” and sequences that rapidly evo…