Skip to main content

Thank you for visiting nature.com. You are using a browser version with limited support for CSS. To obtain the best experience, we recommend you use a more up to date browser (or turn off compatibility mode in Internet Explorer). In the meantime, to ensure continued support, we are displaying the site without styles and JavaScript.

Laos cave fossils prompt rethink of human migration map

A skull fragment and shin bone suggest that early modern humans might have passed through southeast Asia earlier than thought.
  1. Jude Coleman
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed  Google Scholar

Tam Pà Ling cave.

Researchers laboriously sifted through clay, bucket by bucket, using their fingers to hunt for bone fragments. Credit: Fabrice Demeter

Archaeologists have uncovered two new bone fragments in a cave in northern Laos, suggesting that Homo sapiens wandered southeast Asia up to 86,000 years ago. The findings, published this week in Nature Communications1, indicate that humans migrated through the area earlier than previously thought.

Access options

Rent or buy this article

Prices vary by article type

from$1.95

to$39.95

Learn more

Prices may be subject to local taxes which are calculated during checkout

Nature 618, 658-659 (2023)

doi: https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-023-01903-3

Updates & Corrections

  • Correction 14 June 2023: An earlier version of this story misstated how far down researchers excavated in the cave.

References

  1. Freidline, S. E. et al. Nature Commun. https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-023-38715-y (2023).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  2. Demeter, F. et al. Proc. Natl Acad. Sci. USA 109, 14375–14380 (2012).

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  3. Shackelford, L. et al. Quat. Int. 466, 93–106 (2018).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  4. Demeter, F. et al. PLoS ONE 10, e0121193 (2015).

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  5. Demeter, F. et al. Curr. Anthropol. 58, S527–S538 (2017).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  6. Clarkson, C. et al. Nature 547, 306–310 (2017).

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

Download references

Subjects

Latest on:

Nature Careers

Jobs

Nature Briefing

Sign up for the Nature Briefing newsletter — what matters in science, free to your inbox daily.

Get the most important science stories of the day, free in your inbox. Sign up for Nature Briefing

Search

Advanced search

Quick links