If we could go back in time to East Asia between 300,000 and 50,000 years ago, we would find a melting pot of human species coexisting in the region.. Now, a “provocative” study published in Nature Communications suggests the existence of a new human species that could change our understanding of evolution: the Homo juluensis.
Named “Juluren” or “big-headed people” by paleoanthropologist Xiujie Wu, from the Chinese Academy of Sciences, and anthropologist Christopher Bae, from the University of Hawaii.these ancient humans would have coexisted, among others, with Homo sapiens and Neanderthals. What makes them especially intriguing is that their brains were larger than those of any other hominid of their time, including our own species.
Specifically, the H. juluensis he would have wandered the forests of northeastern China hunting horses in small groups and developing skills such as stone tool making and the processing of animal skins for survival, according to the University of Hawaii press release.
Most intriguingly, some of these fossils, found in China, were previously attributed to the Denisovans, a group of ancient humans related to Neanderthals. However, upon closer analysis, Wu and Bae have concluded that these remains do not fit neatly into any of the known categories, be they modern humans, Neanderthals, Denisovans or Homo erectus.
In fact, one of the most interesting proposals of this study is that Denisovans, known primarily for their DNA, may not be a distinct species, but rather a subpopulation within the H. juluensis. Researchers have identified key similarities in fossil jaws and teeth from both populations, although they acknowledge that more evidence is needed to confirm this connection.
“Together, these fossils represent a new form of large-brained hominid,” concluded Wu and Bae in the magazine PaleoAnthropology earlier this year.
“Although we started this project several years ago, we did not expect to be able to propose a new species of hominid (human ancestor) and then be able to organize hominid fossils from Asia into different groups,” Bae said.
An evolutionary puzzle
In particularthe fossils of H. juluensis, including remains of the face and jaw, present an intriguing mosaic of features. On the one hand, they show dental features typical of Neanderthals, but on the other, they exhibit unique characteristics not seen in any other known hominins, including Denisovans.
“If anything,” Wu and Bae write in their study, “the East Asian record is prompting us to recognize how complex human evolution in general is and is actually forcing us to revise and rethink our interpretations of various evolutionary models so that “better fit the growing fossil record.”
An increasingly complex tree
In the last two decades, our family tree has changed radically. According to summary Science Alert, Only in the last 20 years have scientists discovered the Homo floresiensis (2003), the smallest known human species, found in Indonesia; he Homo luzonensis (2007), discovered in the Philippines; the Denisovans (2010), identified through DNA analysis in Russia; he Homo longi (2021), found in northeastern China; and now, the possible H. juluensis joins this growing list of ancient relatives.
Anthropologist John Hawks, who was not involved in the research, called the study “provocative” and agrees that, although the evidence is limited, the human record in Asia is “broader than most specialists have been assuming.” ”.
As Hawks points out on his blog, the term Juluren should not be seen as a substitute for Denisovans, but rather as a way of referring to a particular group of fossils and its possible place in the network of ancient groups.
Despite the excitement generated by this finding, researchers admit that more evidence is needed to confirm the relationship between H. juluensis and other hominids such as the Denisovans. However, this work is a significant step toward better understanding the intricate history of our ancestors in Asia.
Keep reading:
- Spectacular 240-million-year-old “dragon” dinosaur fossil discovered in China
- What polar dinosaurs were like and why they challenge what we thought about these gigantic prehistoric animals
- The images that confirm the existence of a mammal from the “age of the dinosaurs” that was believed to be extinct