The first full analysis of a 4.4-million-year-old early human paints a clearer picture of what the last common ancestor of humans and chimpanzees may have looked like, which is not, after all, that much like a chimp at all. The ancient Ardipithecus ramidus ("Ardi", as the most complete female specimen is known) is described in 11 research papers published online today in Science . The prodigious research effort combines Ardi's fossils with those from many other Ar. ramidus individuals--both male and female--found near the Awash River in the Afar Rift region of Ethiopia. [More]

The first full analysis of a 4.4-million-year-old early human paints a clearer picture of what the last common ancestor of humans and chimpanzees may have looked like, which is not, after all, that much like a chimp at all. The ancient Ardipithecus ramidus ("Ardi", as the most complete female specimen is known) is described in 11 research papers published online today in Science . The prodigious research effort combines Ardi's fossils with those from many other Ar. ramidus individuals--both male and female--found near the Awash River in the Afar Rift region of Ethiopia.

Ar. ramidus , although likely millions of years more recent than the so-called missing link between chimpanzees and humans, represents "coming as close as we've ever come to that last common ancestor," Tim White of the University of California, Berkeley, one of the studies' lead authors, said in a recorded interview for Science .