Deciphering African late middle Pleistocene hominin diversity and the origin of our species.
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Publication Date
2019-09-10Journal Title
Nat Commun
ISSN
2041-1723
Publisher
Springer Science and Business Media LLC
Volume
10
Issue
1
Pages
3406
Language
eng
Type
Article
This Version
VoR
Physical Medium
Electronic
Metadata
Show full item recordCitation
Mounier, A., & Mirazón Lahr, M. (2019). Deciphering African late middle Pleistocene hominin diversity and the origin of our species.. Nat Commun, 10 (1), 3406. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-019-11213-w
Abstract
The origin of Homo sapiens remains a matter of debate. The extent and geographic patterning of morphological diversity among Late Middle Pleistocene (LMP) African hominins is largely unknown, thus precluding the definition of boundaries of variability in early H. sapiens and the interpretation of individual fossils. Here we use a phylogenetic modelling method to predict possible morphologies of a last common ancestor of all modern humans, which we compare to LMP African fossils (KNM-ES 11693, Florisbad, Irhoud 1, Omo II, and LH18). Our results support a complex process for the evolution of H. sapiens, with the recognition of different, geographically localised, populations and lineages in Africa - not all of which contributed to our species' origin. Based on the available fossils, H. sapiens appears to have originated from the coalescence of South and, possibly, East-African source populations, while North-African fossils may represent a population which introgressed into Neandertals during the LMP.
Keywords
Skull, Animals, Hominidae, Humans, Biodiversity, Phylogeny, Models, Biological, Fossils, Africa, Phylogeography
Sponsorship
European Research Council (295907)
Identifiers
External DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-019-11213-w
This record's URL: https://www.repository.cam.ac.uk/handle/1810/303955
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