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Apes and men: Chromosome 2 in humans and the chimpanzee, pt 1 of 3
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Figure 1: Evolutionary Map of Proposed Ape and Human Descent. Note the chimpanzee (Pan troglodytes) and the bonobo or pigmy chimpanzee are grouped together
Of Apes and Men: Chromosome 2 in Humans and the Chimpanzee
by Will Brooks, Ph.D.
The following article was written by A.P. staff scientist Will Brooks, who holds a Ph.D. in Cell Biology from the University of Alabama at Birmingham
“The Evolution of Creationism.” No, you did not misread the statement. This was the title of a symposium that I recently attended at the Experimental Biology 2009 National Conference held in New Orleans, Louisiana (Forrest and Miller, 2009). At this symposium, a couple of the more vocal evolutionists gave a detailed account of how creationists’ thinking has allegedly “evolved” over the last 20 years. The speakers gave a chronological history of landmark court cases regarding the creation/evolution debate and marked how creationists have repeatedly changed their strategies for battling evolutionary thought. (Answering this historical interpretation is beyond the scope of this article, though much could be said in response to this claim.) One of the speakers at this symposium was Dr. Kenneth Miller, a biology professor at Brown University. Miller is a researcher and author, but is well known in large part for his testimony at the 2005 Kitzmiller v. Dover Area School District trial (Kitzmiller v. Dover..., 2005). In this well-publicized court case, parents battled the Dover, Pennsylvania School Board over a statement that the school board developed to be read in 9th grade science class when evolution was taught. Led by Kitzmiller, these parents fought to have the statement removed, because it posited intelligent design as an alternative to Darwin’s theory. Within those courts, Miller gave testimony which was designed to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that evolution was the only explanation for the origin of life. One of the key points of Miller’s testimony, which he kindly recounted at the symposium, regarded the then-recent report that human chromosome 2 looks like it is a fusion of two different chimpanzee chromosomes (Wienberg, et al., 1994).
Humans (Homo sapiens) have 46 chromosomes which make up their nuclear DNA genome; this number is known as the diploid number. Half of these 46 chromosomes are always donated by the mother and half by the father. So, mom and dad each contribute 23 chromosomes—the haploid number—to their offspring. Therefore, the 46 nuclear chromosomes, that all humans possess within their cells, are actually 23 pairs of identical chromosomes. (To be more precise, females have 23 identical pairs, while males have 22 pairs that are identical and the sex chromosomes, X and Y, are paired but not identical.) This diploid number of 46 (23 pairs) is, however, unique to humans among their alleged primate relatives. Genetically speaking, those species which have DNA sequences most similar to that of humans are the great apes. Each of the four species of ape (chimpanzee, gorilla, bonobo, and orangutan) possesses 48 chromosomes or 24 pairs, compared to the 46 chromosomes of humans. However, the genetic difference between Homo sapiens and their alleged primate relatives is significant.
Of the four species of great apes, also known as hominids, the chimpanzee (Pan troglodytes) harbors the most similar DNA sequence to humans, making it genetically the closest to Homo sapiens. As was discussed by Miller in his court testimony, interestingly, if one takes a close look at the gross physical appearance (karyotype) of both human and chimpanzee chromosomes, one finds that all of the chromosomes can be matched between species, except the human chromosome 2. This chromosome is unique in that it looks like a hybrid or fusion of two chimpanzee chromosomes known now as chromosomes 2A and 2B. The similarities are striking and quite convincing that Homo sapiens chromosome 2 is the counterpart of the chimpanzee chromosomes 2A and 2B. This accounts for the difference in diploid numbers between humans and four species of great ape. Humans have 23 pairs including a single chromosome 2 (46 total), while the great apes have 24 pairs including the distinct chromosomes 2A and 2B (48 total). Miller and a host of evolutionists have jumped on this alleged chromosomal fusion as evidence that humans, the chimpanzee, and other hominids all descended from one common ancestor.
SOURCE: Apologetics Press
REFERENCES
Forrest, Barbara and Kenneth R. Miller (2009), “The Evolution of Creationism,” Experimental Biology 2009, [On-line], URL: http://www.eb2009.org/.
Kitzmiller vs. Dover Area School District (2005), Case No. 04cv2688, [On-line], URL: http://www.pamd.uscourts.gov/kitzmiller/kitzmiller_342.pdf.
Weinberg Johannes, et al. (1994), “The Origin of Human Chromosome 2 Analyzed by Comparative Chromo-some Mapping with a DNA Micro-library,” Chromosome Research, 2:405-410.
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