“New evidence has emerged that Neanderthals co-existed with anatomically modern humans for at least a thousand years in central France, a finding that suggests these enigmatic hominids came to a tragic and lingering end.” (News24)

Iodine deficient?: “One of the most mysterious creatures that ever walked the earth was Neandertal, a prehistoric human-like being who first appeared about 230,000 years ago in Europe. Scientists have been debating since the first remains were found in 1856: Was he one of us or a separate species?

Neandertal, who looked very human but was burly and stocky, developed a far less sophisticated culture than Cro-Magnon, the first modern humans in Europe, who emerged about 40,000 years ago. Cro-Magnon apparently existed alongside Neandertal, but no one knows whether they made contact or not, either culturally or sexually. After a 200,000-year run, Neandertal vanished.

No one can say for sure what distinguished Neandertals from modern humans, but Computational Physics and Engineering Division researcher Jerry Dobson has a theory. In an article soon to be published in the Geographical Review, he suggests that Neandertals may have been iodine deficient. A single genetic difference in the thyroid gland, which controls iodine extraction from food, could account for many other differences in bone structure and body shape.

The bones of Neandertal (the spelling scholars prefer over Neanderthal) were first unearthed in Germany but since have been found in inland areas throughout Europe and Western Asia. They reveal numerous similarities to modern humans who suffer from iodine deficiency disorder—in its most severe form, cretinism.

“Distinctive Neandertal traits—overall body proportions, heavy brows and muscles, dental development and wear and propensities for degenerative joint diseases—are identical to those of modern humans suffering from cretinism,” Dobson says. “Whether it was biological—a genetically restricted ability to process iodine—or pathological—a dietary deficiency—I can’t say.”