Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Chordata
Class: Mammalia
Order: Primates
Famiy: Pongidae (which include the great apes)
Genus: Pongo
Species: pygmaeus
Modern Orangutans first originated during the Pleistocene period about 2 million to 100,000 years ago. There are debates on what species they evolved from we know however they did evolve from the great ape family (which they are still a member of today) We know that in this time period Orangutans were about 30% larger than they are today. While Orangutans were evolving in Asia at this time period, other primates were evolving into early human species.
Here is a primate evolutionary tree
Throughout the years there has been debate on if their are actually subspecies of Orangutans that evolved. One being Pongo pygmaeus pygmaeus found on the islands of Borneo and Pongo pygmaeus abelii found on the island of Sumatra. Some researchers think that these are two very different species of Orangutans because they look sightly different and live in different area. On the other hand some researchers believe that they are all the same species and just differ in physical attributes. What do you think? Pictured below is a Bornean Orangutan on the top and a Sumatran on the bottom. See the difference?
Subspecies or not they are a member of the great ape family along with Gorillas, Chimpanzees, Gibbons, Bonobos. Like other great apes, Orangutans genome has been studied and found that it is quite similar to our human genome. The reason we should study primates is because we know that humans evolved from them and by researching our early ancestors could possibly tell us something about ourselves.
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