- Pope criticises Argentina's crackdown on protesters
- Court limits screenings of videos in France mass rape case
- Gurbaz century takes Afghanistan to 311-4 in 2nd ODI
- Central banks face 'difficult balancing act': IMF chief
- McLaren's Norris sets Singapore pace as struggling Verstappen 15th
- Guardiola tells players to lead change over workload fears
- Paris Olympics sports equipment moves to new homes
- 'Happy' Kinghorn relishing life at Toulouse
- Norris sets Singapore pace as Verstappen only 15th
- 8 dead in Israeli strike, source says Hezbollah commander killed
- Germany to bid to host women's Euro 2029
- Portugal brings deadly forest fires under control
- Postecoglou defends Solanke after slow start to Spurs career
- US nuclear plant Three Mile Island to reopen to power Microsoft
- Arteta urges Arsenal to take next step in Man City showdown
- Stock markets fall after Fed-fuelled rally
- Top Hezbollah commander 'killed' in Israel strike
- Poland charges Russian over attack on Navalny ally: prosecutors
- Man City have rest 'advantage' in Arsenal showdown: Guardiola
- Maresca has 'no doubt' in Jackson as Chelsea's number nine
- EU chief announces 35 bn euro loan plan for Ukraine before winter
- From TikTok to Hollywood, the irresistible rise of Italy's Khaby Lame
- Verstappen punished for swearing in Singapore press conference
- Sri Lanka lead by 202 in first New Zealand Test
- Brook 'not too fussed' by England's batting in heavy Australia loss
- India's Ashwin 'happy' to embrace pressure
- A modern 'Trojan Horse': two days of mayhem in Lebanon
- Third of Burundi mpox cases in children under five: UN
- Man Utd appoint Foster + Partners to develop Old Trafford 'masterplan'
- Israel-Hezbollah exchanges intensify on Lebanon border
- French mayor sorry for 'no one died' remark over mass rape trial
- Mohamed Al-Fayed, outsider shunned by British high society
- Lawyers say 'monster' late Harrods owner abused dozens of women
- India in box seat after Bumrah takes four against Bangladesh
- Taiwan retains death penalty but limits use to 'exceptional' cases
- Ferrari's Leclerc sets early pace in Singapore ahead of Norris
- 10 years into Huthi rule, some Yemenis count the cost
- France poised to finally get new govt
- Kompany, Alonso call for action on player workload amid strike talks
- Liverpool goalkeeper Alisson doubtful for Bournemouth clash
- Bumrah takes four as India bowl out Bangladesh for 149
- Sri Lanka 134-1 to take upper hand in first New Zealand Test
- Bayern's Kompany calls for game cap for players amid strike talks
- Christie's expands Hong Kong footprint in hope of art market 'pickup'
- Sultry screen legend Sophia Loren turns 90
- Cambodian opposition figure in court on incitement charge
- Bumrah takes three wickets to have Bangladesh in trouble at 112-8
- Kimchi threat as heatwave drives up South Korea cabbage prices
- UK economic data delivers fresh blow to new govt
- China to 'gradually resume' seafood imports from Japan after Fukushima ban
CMSC | -0.04% | 25.11 | $ | |
RIO | -2.07% | 63.86 | $ | |
SCS | -2.35% | 13.005 | $ | |
RBGPF | 5.79% | 60.5 | $ | |
NGG | 1% | 69.525 | $ | |
GSK | -1.51% | 41 | $ | |
RYCEF | 0.14% | 6.96 | $ | |
CMSD | 0.03% | 25.018 | $ | |
RELX | 0.01% | 48.135 | $ | |
BCE | -0.67% | 34.955 | $ | |
BP | -0.34% | 32.65 | $ | |
JRI | -0.6% | 13.32 | $ | |
VOD | -0.35% | 10.025 | $ | |
BTI | -0.45% | 37.401 | $ | |
AZN | -0.68% | 78.367 | $ | |
BCC | -0.96% | 143.31 | $ |
The mysterious Denisovans
Little is known of the mysterious Denisovans. These distant relatives of the Neanderthals roamed eastern and southern Eurasia but left little trace of their time on Earth.
"Hominin Denisova" was discovered by Swedish paleogeneticist Svante Paabo, the winner of this year's Nobel prize in medicine.
In 2012, Paabo and his team sequenced the DNA of a remarkably well-preserved fragment of bone, 40,000 years old, found four years earlier in the Denisova cave in southern Siberia.
The result was astounding -- they had come across an entirely novel hominin, distinct from Neanderthals and even more from Homo sapiens, aka modern humans.
The Denisovans shared a common ancestor with the Neanderthals until their populations diverged 380,000 to 470,000 years ago.
This was much later than the split between modern humans and Neanderthals/Denisovans, which occurred between 550,000 and 760,000 years ago.
In the same cave, paleontologists later discovered the fossil of a young girl who was part Neanderthal, part Denisovan, proving that these two archaic species interbred.
But while we know the Neanderthals disappeared around 40,000 years ago, we have little idea as to when our other closest evolutionary relative went extinct.
We don't know what the Denisovans looked like either as they left only rare fossilised traces of their time on Earth other than the fragments found in Siberia and a jawbone discovered on the Tibetan Plateau in 2019.
The work of Paabo and his team at the Max Planck Institute in Leipzig have nonetheless shed some light on our mysterious ancestor.
By comparing DNA sequences, they found a "gene flow" between both Denisovan and Neanderthals, and between Denisovans and modern humans.
In other words, before they went extinct, Denisovans also interbred with our species.
Up to six percent of Denisovan DNA is still found in present-day humans in Asia-Pacific and southeast Asia -- Australian Aborigines, Melanesians and the Negritos of the Philippines -- suggesting our far-distant relative roamed over a vast swathe of east and south Eurasia.
Neanderthals, by contrast, lived in western Eurasia.
Scientists believe the ancient ancestors of today's Melanesians interbred with Denisovans from southeast Asia, far from the frozen mountains of Siberia and Tibet.
Proof that the Denisovans had spread as far as the warm tropics of Asia was lacking until a missing link -- a child's tooth at least 130,000 years old -- was discovered in a cave in Laos in 2018.
One of the biggest remaining mysteries is why modern humans were so successful in their expansion and why the Denisovans and Neanderthals went extinct, after having adapted to a Eurasian environment for several hundred thousand years.
O.M.Souza--AMWN