Apeman myth exposed

Humanity's immediate predecessors may have had trouble climbing trees, research suggests - so they may not have been as ape-like as many experts believe.

Scientists concluded this after a close study of how chimpanzees scale trees - virtually vertically and with ease - and then comparing chimp ankle joints with those of hominins, humans' ancestors.

The hominins lived 1.5 million to 4.1 million years ago, a relatively short time after proto-humans and chimps split from a common ancestor (generally thought to have been 4 million to 8 million years ago). Many experts have argued that this ancestor was probably quite chimpanzee-like, and as a result it has been widely assumed that the earliest humans were ape-like too.

But the research contradicts this, showing that - unlike modern chimps - ancient humans were not designed to climb trees.

The study by Dr Jeremy DeSilva of the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor is in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.