Scientists Just Discovered a FOURTH Denisovan Lineage in Asia

Several Denisovan populations repeatedly interbred with modern humans. A new study of Denisovan admixture reveals that four highly divergent populations mixed with modern humans. Scientists believe that individuals from the most recently discovered hominin group (the Denisovans) who interbred with modern humans passed on some of their genes through a series of distinct interbreeding events that shaped early human history.

The discovery of a new human group in the Altai mountains known as Denisovans was one of the most exciting discoveries in human evolution in the last decade. Unlike Neanderthal remains, the Denisovan fossil record only includes a finger bone, jawbone, teeth, and skull fragments. Using the surviving Denisovan segments in modern human genomes, researchers discovered evidence of at least three previous introgression events from different Denisovan populations into modern humans.

Some images courtesy of Mungomagic

SOURCES:
A history of multiple Denisovan introgression events in modern humans
https://www.nature.com/articles/s4158...
https://phys.org/news/2024-11-insight...
https://www.nhm.ac.uk/discover/news/2...