Topic: New Species Of Human Discovered
Joined Wed 01/30/08
A previously unknown kind of humanâthe Denisovansâlikely roamed Asia for thousands of years, probably interbreeding occasionally with humans like you and me, according to a new genetic study.
New Species Of Human Discovered
In fact, living Pacific islanders in Papua New Guinea may be distant descendants of these prehistoric pairings, according to new analysis of DNA from a girl's 40,000-year-old pinkie bone, found in Siberian Russia's Denisova cave.
This "new twist" in human evolution adds substantial new evidence that different types of humansâso-called modern humans and Neanderthals, modern humans and Denisovans, and perhaps even Denisovans and Neanderthalsâmated and bore offspring, experts say.
"We don't think the Denisovans went to Papua New Guinea," located at the northwestern edge of the Pacific region called Melanesia, explained study co-author Bence Viola, an anthropologist at the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology in Leipzig, Germany.
"We think the Denisovan population inhabited most of eastern Eurasia in the same way that Neanderthals inhabited most of western Eurasia," Viola said. "Our idea is that the ancestors of Melanesians met the Denisovans in Southeast Asia and interbred, and the ancestors of Melanesians then moved on to Papua New Guinea."
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Edited by Jeanniebean on Sat 07/23/11 12:00 AM