Neanderthal DNA

Unleashing a new kind of DNA analyzer on a 38,000-year-old fragment of fossilized Neanderthal bone, scientists have reconstructed a portion of that creature's genetic code -- a technological tour de force that has researchers convinced they will soon know the entire DNA sequence of the closest cousin humans ever had.

Their findings? Among others:

Scientists have already identified a few lucky genetic glitches that may have helped launch humans to global dominance while our stocky cousins turned toward an evolutionary dead end. One, in a gene called FOXP2, may have facilitated language. Another may have driven a big increase in brain size.
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The new reports confirm early suggestions that modern humans and Neanderthals split into two genetically distinct groups about 500,000 years ago. They also show no evidence of interbreeding, though a final answer to that question must await further analysis.

Creationists have asserted that Neanderthals were nothing but modern humans with arthritis, ricketts, or some other bone disease. The decoding of the Neanderthal genome will make this claim even harder to support than it already is.