The reversal of human phylogeny: Homo left Africa as erectus , came back as sapiens sapiens
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The reversal of human phylogeny: Homo left Africa as erectus, came back as sapiens sapiens Úlfur Árnason1* and Björn Hallström2
Abstract Background: The molecular out of Africa hypothesis, OOAH, has been considered as an established fact amid population geneticists for some 25–30 years despite the early concern with it among phylogeneticists with experience beyond that of Homo. The palaeontological support for the hypothesis is also questionable, a circumstance that in the light of expanding Eurasian palaeontological knowledge has become accentuated through the last decades. Results: The direction of evolution in the phylogenetic tree of modern humans (Homo sapiens sapiens, Hss) was established inter alia by applying progressive phylogenetic analysis to an mtDNA sampling that included a Eurasian, Lund, and the African Mbuti, San and Yoruba. The examination identified the African populations as paraphyletic, thereby compromising the OOAH. The finding, which was consistent with the out of Eurasia hypothesis, OOEH, was corroborated by the mtDNA introgression from Hss into Hsnn (Neanderthals) that demonstrated the temporal and physical Eurasian coexistence of the two lineages. The results are consistent with the palaeontologically established presence of H. erectus in Eurasia, a Eurasian divergence between H. sapiens and H. antecessor ≈ 850,000 YBP, an Hs divergence between Hss and Hsn (Neanderthals + Denisovans) ≈ 800,000 YBP, an mtDNA introgression from Hss into Hsnn* ≈ 500,000 YBP and an Eurasian divergence among the ancestors of extant Hss ≈ 250,000 YBP at the exodus of Mbuti/San into Africa. Conclusions: The present study showed that Eurasia was not the receiver but the donor in Hss evolution. The findings that Homo left Africa as erectus and returned as sapiens sapiens constitute a change in the understanding of Hs evolution to one that conforms to the extensive Eurasian record of Hs palaeontology and archaeology. Keywords: Human evolution, Molecular phylogenetics, Progressive phylogenetic analysis, PPA, Palaeontology, Out of Eurasia hypothesis, OOEH, Out of Africa hypothesis, OOAH, mtDNA, nuDNA
* Correspondence: [email protected]; [email protected] The present work is dedicated to the memory of Professor Albert Levan (8/3 1905–28/3 1998). It was in his laboratory at the Institute of Genetics, Lund that the correct chromosome number of man, 2n = 46, was determined. For more than 40 years prior to that demonstration, the reiterated belief was that man had 48 chromosomes. 1 Department of Brain Surgery, Faculty of Medicine, University of Lund, Lund, Sweden Full list of author information is available at the end of the article © The Author(s). 2020 Open Access This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if c
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