Page 28 - ARUBA TODAY

A28 SCIENCE
Thursday 8 June 2017

This is us: Earliest fossils of our species found in Morocco

MALCOLM RITTER When these ancient peo- Shea said it made sense to
AP Science Writer ple lived, the site in Moroc- find such old traces of early
NEW YORK (AP) — How co was a cave that might Homo sapiens in northwest-
long has our species been have served as a hunt- ern Africa. He agreed that
around? New fossils from ing camp, where people it doesn’t mean our species
Morocco push the evi- butchered and ate ga- first appeared there.
dence back by about zelles and other prey. They “When it comes to evi-
100,000 years. used fire and their tools dence for human origins
The bones, about 300,000 were made of flint from in northwest Africa versus
years old, were unearthed about 25 miles (40 kilome- eastern Africa versus south-
thousands of miles from ters) away. ern Africa, it’s a tie,” he
the previous record-holder, The undated artist rendering provided by the Max Planck Insti- So where did the fully mod- wrote in an email.
found in fossil-rich eastern tute for Evolutionary Anthropology shows two views of a com- ern human body devel- Richard Potts of the Smith-
Africa. The new discovery posite reconstruction of the earliest known Homo sapiens fossils op? The researchers say sonian Institution’s National
reveals people from an from Jebel Irhoud (Morocco) based on micro computed tomo- evidence suggests primi- Museum of Natural History
graphic scans of multiple original fossils.
early stage of our species’ Associated Press tive forms of Homo sapi- said the Morocco fossils
evolution, with a mix of ens had already widely “appear to reflect the very
modern and more primitive Previously, the oldest known ones, like Neanderthals, spread throughout Africa early transition to Homo
traits. fossils clearly from Homo sa- but only we survive. by around 300,000 years sapiens, very possibly de-
“They are not just like us,” piens were from Ethiopia, Hublin and others described ago. The different popula- noting the outset of the lin-
said Jean-Jacques Hublin, at about 195,000 years old. the new findings in two pa- tions may have exchanged eage to which all people
one of the scientists report- It’s not clear just when or pers released Wednesday beneficial genetic muta- belong.”
ing the find. But they had where Homo sapiens came by the journal Nature . The tions and behaviors, gradu- The site is about 34 miles (55
“basically the face you on the scene in Africa. Hub- discovery could help illu- ally nudging each other to- kilometers) southeast of the
could meet on the train in lin said he thinks an earlier minate how our species ward a more modern form coastal city of Safi, north-
New York.” stage of development pre- evolved, Chris Stringer and of the species, Hublin said. west of Marrakech. Its age
Coupled with other evi- ceded the one revealed Julia Galway-Witham of In this way, he said in an was determined chiefly by
dence, the Moroccan fos- by his team’s discovery. the Natural History Museum interview, modern Homo analyzing bits of flint found
sils suggest that Homo sapi- We evolved from prede- in London wrote in a Nature sapiens may have arisen in there, and the authors con-
ens may have reached its cessors who had differently commentary. more than one place. cluded they were around
modern-day form in more shaped skulls and often The Moroccan specimens So if there’s a Garden of 315,000 years old. Hublin
than one place within Af- heavier builds, but were were found between 2007 Eden, he said, it’s the con- said that since a differ-
rica, said Hublin, of the Max otherwise much more like and 2011 and include a tinent as a whole. ent method suggested a
Planck Institute for Evolu- us than, say, the ape-men skull, a jaw and teeth, along Some experts who didn’t younger age for the site, he
tionary Anthropology in that came before them. with stone tools. Combined participate in the research considers the bones to be
Leipzig, Germany, and the Our species lived at the with other bones that were called that idea possible, about 300,000 years old.
College of France in Paris. same time as some related found there decades ago although not yet demon- Richard Roberts of the Uni-
but not correctly dated, strated. But John Shea, an versity of Woollongong in
the fossil collection repre- anthropologist at Stony Australia, an expert in de-
sents at least five people, Brook University in New termining ages of ancient
including young adults, an York, said it’s more useful sites, supported that con-
adolescent and a child of to think of the different lo- clusion. “I’d say the authors
around 8 years old. Analy- cal populations as a single have presented pretty
sis shows their brain shape one, connected the same convincing evidence for
was more elongated than way a big city is connected the presence of early mod-
Lipstixaruba@outlook.com what people have today. by subway stops. ern humans at this site by
“In the last 300,000 years, “These are parts of a net- 300,000 years ago and per-
the main story is the change work,” through which ideas haps a little earlier,” Roberts
of the brain,” Hublin said. and genes flowed, he said. wrote in an email.q