Neanderthals Interbred With Now-Extinct Early Modern Humans 250,000 Years Ago

The Altai Neanderthal is thought to be 120,000 years old, dating to the last inter-glacial warm period. Now Scientists estimate, that 6% of the Altai Neanderthal genome is of Anatomically Modern Human origin. The study, titled ’Diverse African genomes reveal selection on ancient modern human introgressions in Neanderthals’, was published in the journal ’Cell Biology’. Surprisingly, European Neanderthals, whose nuclear DNA has been recovered, are genetically more similar to one another than to the Altai Neanderthal. Nevertheless, It is believed, based on tools found in the cave, that the Altai Neanderthals migrated from Eastern Europe, rather than the Middle East. However, Modern humans share more genes with all other Neanderthals than with the Altai Neanderthal. This indicates that the introgression event from Neanderthals into humans occurred after the Altai Neanderthals lineage was split from that of other Neanderthals. SOURCE: ’Diverse African