Chimp-human split more recent?
From Times Wire Reports
A new study, certain to be controversial, maintains that chimpanzees and humans split from a common ancestor just 4 million years ago; current estimates have been 5 million to 7 million years ago.
The researchers compared the DNA of chimpanzees, humans and humans’ next-closest ancestor, the gorilla, as well as orangutans. Statistician Asger Hobolth of North Carolina State University and colleagues found evidence that it took only 400,000 years for humans to become a separate species from the common chimp-human ancestor.
