Although figures vary from study to study, it’s currently generally accepted that chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes) and their close relatives the bonobos (Pan paniscus) are both humans’ closest-living relatives, with each species sharing around 98.7% of our DNA.

DNA, or deoxyribonucleic acid, is the hereditary material in humans and almost all other organisms. Nearly every cell in a person’s body has the same DNA. Human DNA consists of about 3 billion bases, and more than 99 percent of those bases are the same in all people.

So the answer to the original questions is that BOTH humans and arabidopsis have 18.7% of their genome shared with each other.

ALL animals and plants share the same DNA which is basically a code of only 4 ‘letters’ which code for the same amino acids from which all proteins are made. It is not surprising that all animals and plants have the majority of their GENES in common.

Plant geneticists from 14 different countries spent the last nine years mapping the genetic makeup of the tomato, and have discovered that the tomato contains 31,760 genes – that’s 7,000 more genes than a human being! The tomato’s genome is actually closer to that of a potato.

For example, people and tomatoes share as much as 60 percent of the same genes.

When it comes to protein-encoding genes, mice are 85 per cent similar to humans. For non-coding genes, it is only about 50 per cent. The National Human Genome Research Institute attributes this similarity to a shared ancestor about 80 million years ago.

About 60 percent of our genes have a recognizable counterpart in the banana genome! “Of those 60 percent, the proteins encoded by them are roughly 40 percent identical when we compare the amino acid sequence of the human protein to its equivalent in the banana,” Brody adds.

Sponges

“Humans share 50% of our DNA with a banana.”

It’s probably not that surprising to learn that humans share 98% of our DNA with chimpanzees–but incredibly, we also share 70% with slugs and 50% with bananas.

It’s possible because humans and slugs (and chimpanzees, and squirrels, and deer, and sharks, and palm trees) all share a common ancestor. Any DNA these creatures share between each other is a legacy of that common ancestry, and an indication of similar structures and biochemical and cellular processes.

Around 40 percent of its genes are closely related to ours. ROBERT WATERSTON headed the U.S. team at Washington University in St. Louis. By comparing worm and human sequence, scientists can identify the related genes, and then use the worm to examine their function.