The DNA of the inhabitants of the Melanesian Islands may contain traces of the DNA of a previously unknown species of people. Geneticist Ryan Bolender spoke about this in his report at the annual meeting of the American Society of Human Genetics.
Ryan Bolender's team at the University of Texas examined the ratio of extinct hominid DNA in the genome of modern Melanesians and found that in addition to the DNA of Neanderthals and Denisovans, genes of a previously unknown species may be present in it. The team used a statistical approach and, taking into account such factors as the size of the populations and the date of their divergence, that is, the period when the populations stopped interbreeding with each other, they found discrepancies between the obtained data and the known information about the ratio of the genome of modern humans and ancient people.
“We found that the population in Africa was likely 50% larger than previously thought. In addition, we have established that the division of people into ancient and modern occurred 440 thousand years ago,”says Bolender. They also found out with colleagues that the populations of ancient people in Eurasia, apparently, did not interbreed as actively as was commonly believed.