eastern evolution

Homo sapiens came out of Africa and conquered the world, more or less in one sweep, or so we used to think. Exciting new finds from China, however, suggest that a significant movement to the East - convenient inasmuch as it allowed people to stay broadly in the same climate and vegetation zone - happened much earlier than previously thought, and much earlier than the expansion into Europe.

I've discussed the latest discoveries from China, also including two archaic human skulls that have been speculatively linked to the Denisovans so far only known by their DNA, in my feature which is out now:

A new continent for human evolution
Current Biology Volume 27, Issue 7, pR243–R245, 3 April 2017

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The Xuchang 1 (A, superior view) and 2 (B, posterior view) crania discovered at the Lingjing site. (Photo: Xiu-jie Wu.)