HONG KONG: On analyzing the fossil remains of prehistoric tooth discovered in remote Russian Denisova cave in Siberia’s Altai Mountains in 2010, researchers have revealed hidden secrets regarding the long-lost human relatives, Denisovans. Since the fossilized remains were about 50,000 and 70,000 years old, researchers reported that Denisovans lived much earlier than ever thought.
Researchers said that Denisovans may have interbred with Neanderthals and some another group of ancient humans. They said so because they found the DNA in modern-day Melanesians who inhabit a number of Pacific Ocean islands. Svante Pääbo, geneticist at the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology in Leipzig, Germany, said “Together with Neanderthals, their sister group in western Asia and Europe, they are the closest relatives of all people alive today”. Researchers even found DNA of Denisovans identical to those in modern-day New Guineans, Polynesians, Australian Aborigines, and other Asian populations.
Dr. Bence Viola, paleoanthropologist at the University of Toronto, said that genetically Denisovans are much more diverse. Susanna Sawyer, geneticist at the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, said the today’s world is much more complex than previously thought. Researchers believe that Denisovans and Neanderthals diverged from modern humans on human family tree about 40,000 years ago. They reported that the key difference between the Denisovans and the modern humans lie in the teeth which the Denisovans had double the tooth of modern humans.
