What makes monkeys stronger than humans

The same procedure is used to study human muscles. Comparing the results with the many studies on those revealed that, contrary to the claims of several other studies, there is nothing special about chimp muscle.

So why, on a pound-for-pound basis, are chimps slightly stronger than humans? The team went on to look at the muscle of chimps that had died of natural causes, which revealed that two-thirds of their muscle consists of fast-twitch fibres, whereas more than half of human fibres are slow-twitch.

Fast-twitch fibres are more powerful , but use more energy and become fatigued faster. This adds to the evidence that walking is considerably more energy-costly for chimps than for people.

The results fit neatly with the idea that early humans evolved to walk or run long distances. Chimpanzees are considered the closest living relative of humans, sharing 95 to 98 percent of the same DNA, according to the Jane Goodall Institute in Washington, D.

But in no way do humans compare with a chimps' sheer strength and the few percentage points in which the two differ are extreme, many experts say. Indeed, chimpanzees have been shown to be about four times as strong as humans comparable in size, according to evolutionary biologist Alan Walker , formerly of Pennsylvania State University. In chimps, the muscle fibers closest to the bones -- those deemed to be the source of strength of both chimps and humans — are much longer and more dense, so a chimp is able to generate more power using the same range of motion, Ross of the Lester Fisher Center said.

Also, unlike humans, chimpanzees have less control over their muscles. As a result, sometimes chimps use more of their muscle strength than necessary, according to Walker's theory, published in the journal Current Anthropology. Such physical lack of control can potentially lead some chimps to become more aggressive when physical. In Thursday's case, however, an internal investigation by the Jane Goodall Institute near Johannesburg showed that the chimps might not have intended to be malicious, Eugene Cussons, director of the institute, told "Good Morning America" today.

Image: Kevin Case. This summer, two chimpanzees attacked a graduate student at the Jane Goodall Institute Chimpanzee Eden. In fact, the unfortunate student probably would have been better off had he been attacked by two humans. Chimps are far stronger than we are. Slate writes :. A chimpanzee had, pound for pound, as much as twice the strength of a human when it came to pulling weights. The apes beat us in leg strength, too, despite our reliance on our legs for locomotion.