London, Dec 21 (IANS) Ever wondered why a human baby needs an year to start walking, while a newborn foal is up and about soon after birth?
A team of researchers from Sweden’s Lund University compared 24 species and found that human babies actually start walking at the same stage in brain development as most other walking mammals, from small rodents to elephants.

Regardless of differences in their brain and body size, gestation time, and brain maturity at birth, the young from all species start walking at the same relative time point in brain development, according to the findings published in PNAS.

The Lund group comprised neurophysiologists Martin Garwicz, Maria Christensson and developmental psychologist Elia Psouni.

They used conception and not birth as the starting point of motor development in their comparison between different mammals. This revealed astonishing similarities among species that diverged in evolution 100 million years ago.

“Humans certainly have more brain cells and bigger brains than most other terrestrial mammalian species, but with respect to walking, brain development appears to be similar for us and other mammals. Our study demonstrates that the difference is quantitative, not qualitative,” says Garwicz.

Based on knowledge about development in other mammals it is, therefore, possible to actually predict with high precision when human babies will start to walk.

The study strongly contradicts the assumption that human motor development is unique because of complexity of the brain and thereby sheds new light on theories in evolutionary and developmental biology, says Garwicz.