Remains unearthed more than 10 years ago from a cave in the Chinese province of Yunnan have finally revealed their secrets, with DNA analysis revealing not only who left them, but finally who they were. Where will the ancestors go?
A Strange Fossil in Southern China Has Revealed an Interesting Link With the First Americans
Researchers at the Chinese Academy of Sciences examined nuclear and mitochondrial sequences extracted from a 14,000-year-old skull, revealing that the woman – named Mengzi Ren – was once deeply related to these populations. There was a connection that would eventually be the first woman to step into it. United States
Since their discovery in 2008, dozens of ancient human bones left behind at Malodong (Red Deer Cave) in southwest China have left anthropologists scratching their heads over who they might belong to.
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Without enough collagen to base a carbon dating analysis on, their age can only be estimated from features around their grave site. It is also unclear whether the bone mix, which includes a fragment of the skull and the upper part of the femur, all come from the same individual.
What is clear is that whoever left them behind represented a unique combination of ancient and modern characteristics.
They may, unlike more primitive populations of Homo floresiensis, have been ancestral humans clinging to survival in Southeast Asia. Or perhaps they were a hybrid mixture of very old humans and a more modern population.
It is also possible that despite thousands of years of evolution, some ancestral traits remain embedded in their genes.
To determine where Mengzi Ren sits in our sprawling family tree, the researchers sequenced what DNA they could extract, mapping it to the standard genomic reference model.
Because mitochondrial DNA is only passed through the mother’s egg, they can identify her maternal lineage as a now-extinct branch represented by only two modern-day subpopulations.
A closer look at his nuclear DNA confirms Magi-Ren’s close relationship to physically modern humans, but also rules out his heritage from more ancient stock.
“The ancient DNA technique is a really powerful tool,” says archaeologist Bing Su of the Chinese Academy of Sciences.
“This tells us definitively that the Red Deer Cavemen, despite their unusual morphological features, were modern humans rather than primitive species such as Neanderthals or Denisovans.”
Although the Mengzi Ren are more closely related to present-day southern Chinese populations than to the north, they have less in common with those who now live in Southeast Asia, suggesting that they were already in the region thousands of years ago. There was a well-structured, diverse population.
This does not mean that Asia was settled from the bottom up. There is strong evidence that a relatively small population of humans also moved down from the north to settle the East, a group that crossed the ice-covered Bering Strait to populate the vast wilderness of the Americas. will be divided for
Linking Mengzi Ren’s DNA to this northern population line means that there is now strong evidence of a relationship between not only modern Asian populations and America’s First Nations, but also ancient Asian races.
“Such data will not only help build a more complete picture of our ancestors’ migrations, but also provide important information about how humans adapted their physical appearance to local environments over time. “How do they change, such as in response to changes in skin color. Exposure to sunlight,” says Su.
If all goes according to plan, Mingzhi Ren won’t be alone in understanding his genes. Not only does Red Deer Cave have more secrets to uncover, but so do many other Pleistocene sites across Asia.
Within these bones we will undoubtedly uncover more details about how today’s human population has traveled, settled and explored every inch of our planet.
