O’Neill says it’s likely other apes have a similar muscle strength to chimpanzees.

Chimps, on the other hand, have much less control so when they actuate their muscles, it’s more of an ‘all or nothing’ affair, with each neuron triggering a high number of muscle fibers. More gray matter allows humans to perform highly finely tuned motor tasks, such as using complex tools, throwing accurately, and manipulating small objects. “Chimpanzee muscle is really no different than human muscle in terms of the force that individual fibers exert,” said O’Neill.ĪLSO READ: Left, right, or ambidextrous: What determines handedness? They found that there was nothing special about chimp muscle. Using a technique called gel electrophoresis, the team broke down the muscles into individual muscle fibers and, again, compared the results with human muscle fiber data. This initial reading showed that the muscle output was about the same as that of humans, on an individual muscle fiber basis.Īnother analysis was performed on muscle tissue harvested from the pelvic and hind limb muscles of three chimpanzee cadavers. The samples were painstakingly separated into individual fibers and then stimulated so the force that they generated could be measured. The team performed biopsies on thigh and calf muscles collected from three anesthetized chimps housed at the State University of New York at Stony Brook. The most recent study that investigated chimp strength was conducted in 2017 by a team of researchers led by Matthew O’Neill, an anatomy and evolution researcher at the University of Arizona College of Medicine in Phoenix. In Bauman’s era, every biologist and primatologist was convinced that chimps were much stronger than humans, but no one had proven it.ĪLSO READ: After 50 years, scientists finally reveal the secrets of Europe’s last panda species Chimps: not so strong, but still a force to be reckoned with The myth that chimpanzees are five to eight times stronger than humans originated from a study conducted by biologist John Bauman in the 1920s. Origins of the “Five Times Stronger” Myth However, chimps are no pushovers, as we’ll see. And since the average chimpanzee is much smaller than the average human, overall we aren’t all that weak compared to our closest relatives. In reality, the most recent studies suggest that chimpanzees are only about 1.5 times stronger than humans pound-for-pound. Such claims are based on outdated and flawed research, some of which date from over a century ago. Personally, I wouldn’t bet any money on that. Does this mean that a chimp can lift a human and throw him around like a rag doll? Maybe if you ask Joe Rogan. Astonishingly, his victim, Charla Nash, survived, but you could argue that in many ways, her life too came to an abrupt end that day.A hairless chimp showing off his jacked physique Credit: Reddit/ u/alrightlibrary.Ĭhimpanzees are often described as being much stronger than humans, but just how much stronger are they? A popular factoid claims that chimpanzees are five to eight times stronger than humans. I can’t … He’s eating her! He’s eating her! Please! God! Please! Where are they? Where are they?” “Gun! They got to shoot him! Please! Please! Hurry! Hurry! Please! I can’t.

“He-he ripped her face off! He's eating her face! 'He ripped her apart! Hurry up! Hurry up! Please!” Herold breathlessly replies. 'Tell me, what is the monkey doing?,' the operator asks as Travis's harrowing, almost gleeful, wails and screeches echo down the line. It's hard to know what is more chilling about Sandra Herold's 911 call - hearing her helpless sobbing as she reveals her pet chimp is 'eating' her friend's face, or the ape's frenzied screams in the background.įor an excruciating 12 minutes, Sandra is heard pleading for police to rush to her home to shoot dead Travis, the animal she had raised as her own son for the previous 14 years, reports the Daily Star.

Ripped hairless chimpanzee