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canetoad

(19,527 posts)
Fri Sep 26, 2025, 01:39 AM Friday

Million-year-old skull reconstruction hints at a new chapter in human evolution

Scientists have reconstructed a million-year-old skull found in central China, and say they've identified which group of early humans it belonged to.

The researchers suggest their findings, published today in the journal Science, push back when modern humans evolved.

Our species, Homo sapiens, is the only living species in the Homo genus.

But in the past million years, many other Homo species have wandered the Earth, and palaeontologists have have been trying to reconstruct the human family tree.

Previously, researchers thought the common ancestor of all human species, Homo erectus, diverged into several groups about 600,000 years ago.

https://www.abc.net.au/news/science/2025-09-26/million-year-old-skull-reconstruction-and-human-evolution/105819746

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Million-year-old skull reconstruction hints at a new chapter in human evolution (Original Post) canetoad Friday OP
The earliest known fossils assigned to the genus Homo come from Ledi-Geraru, Ethiopia, dated to about 2.8 million years MrWowWow Friday #1

MrWowWow

(1,377 posts)
1. The earliest known fossils assigned to the genus Homo come from Ledi-Geraru, Ethiopia, dated to about 2.8 million years
Fri Sep 26, 2025, 03:17 AM
Friday

The earliest known fossils assigned to the genus Homo come from Ledi-Geraru, Ethiopia, dated to about 2.8 million years ago.

Specimen: A partial lower jawbone (mandible, LD 350-1).

Discovery: Found in 2013, announced in 2015.

Significance: Pushes the origin of Homo back earlier than previously thought (older than Homo habilis at ~2.4–2.1 million years ago).

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