Possible new human species found in China
Possible new species of human discovered in China https://t.co/DNLR2rZP34 pic.twitter.com/j41pP8Wth0
— Times LIVE (@TimesLIVE) January 27, 2015
Digital Reporter
Tuesday, January 27, 2015, 3:22 PM - An ancient fossil discovered at the bottom of the seafloor in China near Taiwan may be from a previously-unknown species of human, researchers say.
The discovery has led researchers to believe there may have been several groups of now-extinct human species that lived in Asia prior to the emergence of the modern Homo sapien approximately 40,000 years ago.
The fossil -- a nearly complete lower jaw with teeth -- was retrieved by a fishing net 120 metres below the surface of the Penghu Channel.
It has been dubbed Penghu 1. The fisherman who found it sold it to an antique shop, and it was eventually submitted to Taiwan's Museum of Natural Sciences.
An examination of the fossil suggests a unclassified species of human lived in parts of northern China between 60,000 and 120,000 years ago, although scientists say the jaw and teeth look "unexpectedly primitive", according to LiveScience.
Scientists are also working with the theory the fossil may have been the result of inter-breeding between two known human species.
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Researchers say they don't have enough information to determine if Penghu 1 represents a new species of human.
"We need other skeletal parts to evaluate the degree of its uniqueness," study co-author Yousuke Kaifu, a paleoanthropologist from Japan's National Museum of Nature and Science, told Live Science.
"This is a very different, complex and exciting story compared to what I was taught in school." A detailed write-up on the findings was published Tuesday in Nature Communications.
Other ancient ancestors of the modern human discovered in Asia include Neanderthals -- our closest relative -- Denisovians, Homo erectus, and Homo floresiensis.
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