Figure 1: Humans have much more individually distinctive faces than many animals. | Nature Communications

Figure 1: Humans have much more individually distinctive faces than many animals.

From: Morphological and population genomic evidence that human faces have evolved to signal individual identity

Figure 1

(a) Human populations show extensive variability in facial morphology that is used for individual recognition. Patterns of elevated variability are even maintained in more genetically homogeneous populations such as the Finnish, as demonstrated by the portraits of six male soldiers. (b) In contrast to the variability present in human faces, many animals such as king penguins have much more uniform appearances. While king penguins are not known to visually recognize individuals, they do have highly distinctive vocalizations that are used for individual recognition. (Photo credits: SA-kuva, Finnish Armed Forces photograph; Wikimedia commons.)

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