2024-04-05 06:46:34
Fossil early ones H. wise migration evidence suggests that our species left Africa at least 210,000 years ago, and genetic evidence suggests that a large wave of migration around 70,000 years ago was the most successful, providing genes for all modern non-Africans. However, there is a severe shortage across Eurasia H. wise fossils dating from 60,000 to 45,000 years ago – so the researchers of the new study set out to find out where modern humans were at that time.
Based on climate models and genetic data, the research team found that the Persian Plateau was the most suitable place for humans to settle during this period, according to a March 25 report. in a study published in the journal Nature Communications.
But not everyone agrees with their findings – and say more evidence is needed.
The Persian Plateau, which scholars in a previous study defined as the population center, includes most of modern Iran, as well as the Persian Gulf and Mesopotamia. The team believes that the ancestors of all present-day non-Africans lived here between 70,000 and 45,000 years ago.
Previously, researchers examined information from Paleolithic Eurasian genomes and linked this data to archaeological evidence of changes in stone tool technology. Based on this data, they determined that modern humans were likely concentrated in a population center that was the base for many migrations across Eurasia. However, determining the population center required the addition of a paleoclimate model, which is included in the new study. After modeling hunter-gatherers H. wise By looking at population distribution and reconstructing areas that had suitable environmental conditions for human habitation between 70,000 and 45,000 years ago, the researchers determined that the Persian Plateau was the geographic area where the population center was most likely.
The Persian Plateau is also home to known Neanderthal fossil sites dating to the H. wise dates of stay. “Admixture with Neanderthals occurred during this period, so it’s possible that it happened inside the concentrate,” says Leonardo Vallini, a molecular anthropologist at the University of Padua in Italy and lead author of the study. “However, it’s also possible that the two groups avoided each other and interactions were much less frequent.”
In this most important period of human evolution and expansion H. wise were hunter-gatherers, explains L. Vallini. But in this area, people probably exchanged the most important information. The center “could have served as an incubator for the development of cultural innovations” such as stone art and projectile weapons, the researchers wrote in the study.
But other experts believe more evidence is needed to identify a possible population center. Sang-Hee Lee, a biological anthropologist at the University of California Riverside who was not involved in the study, says the new study provides a picture of a dynamic ancestral residential center. However, he questions whether the paleoecology model is appropriate for ancestral humans.
“The paleoecological data from ‘the center’ is based on a single data point in Iran,” Lee says, referring to the single data point the study authors present to support their hypothesis that the center was a hospitable site. “Of course, the absence of evidence does not mean that it did not exist at all.”
The study authors acknowledge that more hominin fossils and climate data are needed to confirm their hypothesis.
But if the Persian Plateau was indeed a population center for tens of thousands of years, this important region is ideal for searching for both fossil evidence and paleoecological data that could fill in the gaps of ancestral human migrations across Eurasia, the study authors say.
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2024-04-05 06:46:34