Ancient humans may have been mothers to some Neanderthals earlier than we thought

An early wave of modern human ancestors interbred with Neanderthals between 470,000 and 220,000 years ago, a new DNA discovery from an ancient Neanderthal thigh bone suggests. That’s much earlier than experts had thought, and it could help explain why human DNA seems to be appearing in Neanderthal genomes much earlier than it should.

It’s not entirely clear when humans and Neanderthals split — and there are conflicting answers in ancient DNA. The 124,000-year-old leg bone offers scientists a peek at the DNA animals get primarily from their mothers, tucked away in the cells’ energy generators. It looked a lot more human-like than it should, according to scientists led by Cosimo Posth at the…

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