Discover a new human species in the underground world

Scientists have unearthed more than 100 different pieces of remains belonging to an adult and two children in an underground cave in South Africa, most likely belonging to a new species.

They are almost certain they have found a new human species / ph: youtube@The Fossil Vault

According to New Scientist, this is not the first stunned discovery that the team led by archaeologist Lee Beger (from the University of Johannesburg, South Africa) brought back from the UW 105 cave in Johannesburg. In 2013, they once found a new human species here, which was later named Homo naledi.

The coming back in 2020, the team continued to find more than 100 pieces of remains belonging to 3 individuals of a species clearly belonging to the genus Homo but with very primitive features: large teeth specialized to tear hard plants, coarse and firm bones. ... These characteristics suggest that this species must be one of the early representatives of the human world, still in the form of humanoid ape.

They brought fragments of the remains, identified as belonging to an adult and two children to check with some known ancient human species. But according to Dr. Beger, every time his team tries to establish a relationship between these remains and a known human being, something is always out of place. Their teeths are like Paranthropus Robusts but not fully matched, the jaws a bit like Homo naledi but the body, shoulders, pelvis and thigh are more primitive ... The creature's chest is quite similar to the original Australopithicus, while a few small teeths similar to Homo sapiens (modern people, it is us) ...

Writing on eLife, the authors say they are almost certain they have found a new human species, never recorded anywhere on Earth. They are working hard to determine the age of the fossil bone fragments to reinforce the hypothesis as well as to give this new species a suitable position in the human family tree.