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A late Middle Pleistocene Denisovan mandible from the Tibetan Plateau

Chen, Fahu, Welker, Frido, Shen, Chuan-Chou, Bailey, Shara E., Bergmann, Inga, Davis, Simon, Xia, Huan, Wang, Hui, Fischer, Roman, Freidline, Sarah E., and others. (2019) A late Middle Pleistocene Denisovan mandible from the Tibetan Plateau. Nature, 569 (7756). pp. 409-412. ISSN 0028-0836. (doi:10.1038/s41586-019-1139-x) (KAR id:74280)

Abstract

Denisovans are members of a hominin group who are currently only known directly from fragmentary fossils, the genomes of which have been studied from a single site, Denisova Cave in Siberia. They are also known indirectly from their genetic legacy through gene flow into several low-altitude East Asian populations and high-altitude modern Tibetans6. The lack of morphologically informative Denisovan fossils hinders our ability to connect geographically and temporally dispersed fossil hominins from Asia and to understand in a coherent manner their relation to recent Asian populations. This includes understanding the genetic adaptation of humans to the high-altitude Tibetan Plateau, which was inherited from the Denisovans. Here we report a Denisovan mandible, identified by ancient protein analysis, found on the Tibetan Plateau in Baishiya Karst Cave, Xiahe, Gansu, China. We determine the mandible to be at least 160 thousand years old through U-series dating of an adhering carbonate matrix. The Xiahe specimen provides direct evidence of the Denisovans outside the Altai Mountains and its analysis unique insights into Denisovan mandibular and dental morphology. Our results indicate that archaic hominins occupied the Tibetan Plateau in the Middle Pleistocene epoch and successfully adapted to high-altitude hypoxic environments long before the regional arrival of modern Homo sapiens.

Item Type: Article
DOI/Identification number: 10.1038/s41586-019-1139-x
Uncontrolled keywords: Archaeology; Biological anthropology; Evolutionary genetics
Subjects: G Geography. Anthropology. Recreation > GN Anthropology
Divisions: Divisions > Division of Human and Social Sciences > School of Anthropology and Conservation
Depositing User: Matthew Skinner
Date Deposited: 06 Jun 2019 08:34 UTC
Last Modified: 28 Jul 2022 22:10 UTC
Resource URI: https://kar.kent.ac.uk/id/eprint/74280 (The current URI for this page, for reference purposes)

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