New! Sign up for our free email newsletter.
Science News
from research organizations

100,000-year-old human skulls from east Asia reveal complex mix of trends in time, space

Date:
March 2, 2017
Source:
Washington University in St. Louis
Summary:
Two partial archaic human skulls, from the Lingjing site, Xuchang, central China, provide a new window into the biology and populations patterns of the immediate predecessors of modern humans in eastern Eurasia.
Share:
FULL STORY

Two partial archaic human skulls, from the Lingjing site, Xuchang, central China, provide a new window into the biology and populations patterns of the immediate predecessors of modern humans in eastern Eurasia.

Securely dated to about 100,000 years ago, the Xuchang fossils present a mosaic of features.

  • With late archaic (and early modern) humans across the Old World, they share a large brain size and lightly built cranial vaults with modest brow ridges.
  • With earlier (Middle Pleistocene) eastern Eurasian humans, they share a low and broad braincase, one that rounds onto the inferior skull.
  • With western Eurasian Neandertals, they share two distinct features -- the configuration of their semicircular canals and the detailed arrangement of the rear of the skull.

"The biological nature of the immediate predecessors of modern humans in eastern Eurasia has been poorly known from the human fossil record," said Erik Trinkaus, a corresponding author for the study and professor of anthropology at Washington University in St. Louis. "The discovery of these skulls of late archaic humans, from Xuchang, substantially increases our knowledge of these people."

More importantly, he noted: "The features of these fossils reinforce a pattern of regional population continuity in eastern Eurasia, combined with shared long-terms trends in human biology and populational connections across Eurasia. They reinforce the unity and dynamic nature of human evolution leading up to modern human emergence."


Story Source:

Materials provided by Washington University in St. Louis. Note: Content may be edited for style and length.


Journal Reference:

  1. Zhan-Yang Li, Xiu-Jie Wu, Li-Ping Zhou, Wu Liu, Xing Gao, Xiao-Mei Nian, Erik Trinkaus. Late Pleistocene archaic human crania from Xuchang, China. Science, 2017; 355 (6328): 969 DOI: 10.1126/science.aal2482

Cite This Page:

Washington University in St. Louis. "100,000-year-old human skulls from east Asia reveal complex mix of trends in time, space." ScienceDaily. ScienceDaily, 2 March 2017. <www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2017/03/170302144009.htm>.
Washington University in St. Louis. (2017, March 2). 100,000-year-old human skulls from east Asia reveal complex mix of trends in time, space. ScienceDaily. Retrieved March 19, 2024 from www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2017/03/170302144009.htm
Washington University in St. Louis. "100,000-year-old human skulls from east Asia reveal complex mix of trends in time, space." ScienceDaily. www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2017/03/170302144009.htm (accessed March 19, 2024).

Explore More

from ScienceDaily

RELATED STORIES