Scientists discover new human species with extremely unusual feature
Scientific breakthroughs have revealed a new ancient human species in China, although this particular subject has a rather bizarre feature, differentiating it from what we currently know.
Discoveries are often represented by key moments in science and history, whether it be the reveal of a hidden Mayan city or the spotting of a galactic pool of water found billions of light-years away.
You often don't expect to find a whole new species of human though, yet that is what Professor Christopher J. Bae at the University of Hawai'i stumbled upon when researching ancient human-like species in Asia.
Bae discovered that what he has called the 'Homo juluensis' lived approximately 300,000 years ago in eastern Asia around what is now areas like Xuchang, Xiahe, and Xujiayao in China, among others.
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This ancient human-like species likely hunted wild horses, made stone tools, and processed animal hides, as reported by the University of Hawai'i News.
What serves as a significant detraction from other ancient human species like Homo neanderthalensis and Homo erectus, however, is the sheer size of their heads.
Compared to the heads of Neanderthals and Homo sapiens - which measure around 88 and 82 cubic inches respectively - the skulls of Homo juluensis were discovered to be around 109 cubic inches, which is quite a sizeable increase.
The study's evidence also draws similarities to Denisovans, who existed in Asia between 285 and 25 thousand years ago, linking the teeth structure and traits to Homo juluensis.
What remains remarkable about this research, however, isn't just that a new species of humans has been discovered, but alongside this was a new way of organizing fossil evidence.
Bae has described it as a 'clearer system' that allows them to better organize human fossils, comparing it to organizing an 'old family photo album where some of the pictures are blurry or hard to identify'.
Argued within the research found in the Nature Communications journal, Bae details:
"If anything, the eastern Asian record is prompting us to recognize just how complex human evolution is more generally and really forcing us to revise and rethink our interpretations of various evolutionary models to better match the growing fossil record."
This, then, could not only serve as a major breakthrough within the field, but it could also open up the doors to further discoveries both about existing species and potentially new ones too.
Hopefully we'll hear more about our new friend Homo juluensis soon, as their bizarrely large head might be able to tell us more about the ancient lives of our species - especially in Asia.