Washington:
Scientists this week offered new genetic evidence to support the claim that all known human beings today anywhere in the world are descended from a single African ancestor, a woman who lived about 200,000 years ago and whose descendants swept across the earth, replacing a more primitive human speech as they went.
In the new data published in the journal Science, scientists compare a special form of genetic material taken from contemporary people from all areas of the world and suggest the family tree of modern humans has its roots firmly planted in a woman who lived in Sub-Saharan Africa.
It has long been accepted the human evolution began in Africa about 2.5 million years ago with the appearance of Homo habilis. About a million years later, this species gave rise to the Homo erectus, the first human ancestor to migrate out of Africa and to populate southern Eurasia.
(PTl – Hindustan Times, Sept 29).
