Carl Zimmer describes a recent paper documenting lateral gene transfer across a broad phylogeny of organisms. It's one of the topics covered in his book, Microcosm, and his post has some very cool pictures.
Neandertals
For years, I've worked on their bones. Now I'm working on their genes. Read more about the science studying these ancient people.
Denisova
From a finger bone of an ancient human came the record of a completely unexpected population. My lab is working on the science of the Denisova genome.
Acceleration
The advent of agriculture caused natural selection to speed up greatly in humans. We're uncovering some of the ways that populations have rapidly changed during the last 10,000 years.
Malapa
Just outside Johannesburg, the Malapa site is producing some of the most exciting finds in human evolution. This site is the headquarters of the Malapa Soft Tissue Project.