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Controversial study claims humans reached Americas 100,000 years earlier than thought

Nature (2017)Cite this article

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Broken mastodon bones hint that Homo sapiens wasn’t the first hominin to get to the New World.

Ancient humans settled in North America around 130,000 years ago, suggests a controversial study — pushing the date back more than 100,000 years earlier than most scientists accept. The jaw-dropping claim, made in Nature1, is based on broken rocks and mastodon bones found in California that a team of researchers say point to human activity.

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References

  1. Holen, S. R. et al. Nature 544, 479–483 (2017).

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  2. Skoglund, P. & Reich, D. Curr. Opin. Genet. Dev. 41, 27–35 (2016).

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  3. Holen, S. R. Quat. Int. 142–143, 30–43 (2006).

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Authors
  1. Ewen Callaway
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Read the related News & Views article: 'Unexpectedly early signs of Americans'

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Callaway, E. Controversial study claims humans reached Americas 100,000 years earlier than thought. Nature (2017). https://doi.org/10.1038/nature.2017.21886

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