By sequencing the genome of the Stone Age boy from Ballito Bay (BBA), South Africa, the deepest population divergence in Homo sapiens was estimated to 350,000–260,000 years ago (Schlebusch et al. 2017). Consistent with the recent admixture into all modern-day Khoe-San groups, which reduces population divergence time estimates (Schlebusch et al. 2017) (supplementary section 8 and figs. S7.2, S7.4, and S8.2, Supplementary Material online), we found the mean divergence time of all Khoe-San populations from all other groups to be within the 200–300 ka range (supplementary tables S7.2 and S7.2, Supplementary Material online, and fig. 3). These dates correlate well with previous estimates (Gronau et al. 2011; Veeramah et al. 2012) that also fall within the 200–300 ka (kiloannum: thousand years ago) range when applying the mutation rate used here. The Ju|’hoansi (with the lowest level of recent admixture) had a point estimate of ∼270 ka (∼9,000 generations), SD 20 ka (GphoCS method; TT method: ∼260 ka, SD 12 ka), whereas the Nama (with the greatest level of recent admixture) had a point estimate of ∼210 ka, SD 30 ka (TT method: ∼210 ka, SD 30 ka; supplementary tables S7.1 and S7.2, Supplementary Material online). The Mbuti then diverged around ∼220 ka, SD 10 ka (TT method: 215 ka, SD 9 ka), with the other population divergences occurring subsequently. We inferred a mean divergence time of ∼160 ka, SD 20 ka (TT method: ∼190 ka, SD 20 ka) among the different San groups, consistent with previous estimates (Schlebusch et al. 2017).
https://academic.oup.com/mbe/article/37/10/2944/5874945
How much of that was Neanderthal?
Using one such new technique, first in 2016 and then again in a preprint posted earlier this summer, Siepel and his team found that around 3% of Neanderthal DNA — and possibly as much as 6% — came from modern humans who mated with the Neanderthals more than 200,000 years ago. The same group who gave rise to modern humans throughout the world also furnished Neanderthals with (at least a little) more DNA than the Neanderthals would later give them. “You think you’re just looking at a Neanderthal,” Siepel said, “but you’re actually looking at a mixture of Neanderthal and modern human.”
We find that a population that diverged early from other modern humans in Africa contributed genetically to the ancestors of Neanderthals from the Altai Mountains roughly 100,000 years ago. By contrast, we do not detect such a genetic contribution in the Denisovan or the two European Neanderthals.
https://www.nature.com/articles/nature16544
Wow Altai Mountains are serious meditation Daoist site.
between Neanderthals and ancient 12
humans who left Africa over 100 thousand years (Hum→Nea)
many of the excess shared alleles are older than the 28
Neanderthal/human divergence,classifying 3% of the Neanderthal genome as introgressed from ancient humans
Ghostly Genes From Super-archaic Hominin Found in Late Human Species
Small-brained creature interbred with the common ancestor of Neanderthals and Denisovans, then half a million years later with Denisovans too – and you may have traces in your DNA
They found that 1 percent of the Denisovan genome came from this mysterious relative. It's estimated, in turn, some modern humans could hold about 15 percent of these "super-archaic" gene regions....It's estimated, in turn, some modern humans could hold about 15 percent of these "super-archaic" gene regions. Who could this unknown ancestor be? One potential contender could be Homo erectus, an extinct human ancestor who lived in Africa about 1 million years ago. Dec 27, 2020
Population and group sizes of the super-archaic hominin is believed to have been small: They had migrated from Africa to a radically different environment and were “basically African apes trying to make a living in that environment,” Rogers describes.
Neandersovans had big brains, and so of course did their descendants the Denisovans. Yet if their sex-partner had split from the Homo tree 2 million years ago, wouldn’t it have had a very small brain? “I presume so, but I’ve never seen one,” Rogers laughs in conversation with Haaretz. “Judging by the time frame, they must have been much smaller than ours.”
To get this argument out of the way, are Neanderthals, Denisovans and We in fact separate species? Theoretically, because we interbred and had fertile offspring, we’re all the same species (albeit different types). By that criterion, this 2-million-year-old demi-ape is also the same species, though whether it could have fruitfully interbred with us today is an open question. For the purposes of clarity, we shall call each one a species.
fascinating.
In fact, it’s possible we didn’t even get them from the Neanderthals or Denisovans but admixed directly ourselves with the last remnants of the super-archaic population in Eurasia.
It may have reached the Melanesians from Denisovans, but seems to have originated in the super-archaic.
Finally, parallel research found a super-archaic admixture in today’s Yoruba and Mende in West Africa, apparently about 43,000 years ago (give or take a big margin of error). That African super-archaic split from the human tree before the Neandersovans did, according to that research, and clearly also survived for a long time, though in Africa.
The differences in time and place are vast. But could it be the same archaic that we seem to find irresistible? It could be, or it could be a completely different one, Rogers says. “It will be interesting going forward to figure out if the population that admixed with Africans was the same as the one we are finding evidence of,” he adds.
That's how the short stature of the "Pygmies" arose!! Only 43,000 years ago? Give or take a big margin of error - must be a big margin.
