Adam Rutherford Books

When we speak of genetics today, we often forget how astonishingly recent it all is. Barely a century ago, Gregor Mendel’s pea plants hinted that inheritance followed patterns, but the molecule responsible — DNA — remained an enigma. From the discovery of its double helix in 1953 to the completion o...

From A Brief History of Everyone Who Ever Lived: The Human Story Retold Through Our Genes

At the heart of our genetic story lies Africa — the cradle of Homo sapiens. For decades, fossil evidence suggested that modern humans emerged roughly 200,000 years ago. Genetics confirmed and deepened this narrative. By analyzing mitochondrial DNA, inherited from mothers, and the Y chromosome, passe...

From A Brief History of Everyone Who Ever Lived: The Human Story Retold Through Our Genes

To understand what it means to be human, we must first step backward – far backward – into the tangled tree of life. Our lineage diverged from that of chimpanzees and bonobos roughly six million years ago, and the genetic evidence tells a story of remarkable similarity. We share almost 99 percent of...

From The Book of Humans: The Story of How We Became Us

When we first discovered that chimpanzees use sticks to fish termites out of their mounds, we were forced to admit that tool use was not uniquely ours. Since then, we have found toolmakers everywhere – from crows and octopuses to beavers and elephants. Nonetheless, human technology exists on an enti...

From The Book of Humans: The Story of How We Became Us