Early presence of Homo sapiens in Southeast Asia by 86–68 kyr at Tam Pà Ling, Northern Laos

Research output: Contribution to journalJournal articleResearchpeer-review

Documents

  • Fulltext

    Final published version, 6.88 MB, PDF document

  • Sarah E. Freidline
  • Kira E. Westaway
  • Renaud Joannes-Boyau
  • Philippe Duringer
  • Jean-Luc Ponche
  • Mike W. Morley
  • Vito C. Hernandez
  • Meghan S. McAllister-Hayward
  • Clément Zanolli
  • Philipp Gunz
  • Inga Bergmann
  • Phonephanh Sichanthongtip
  • Daovee Sihanam
  • Souliphane Boualaphane
  • Thonglith Luangkhoth
  • Viengkeo Souksavatdy
  • Anthony Dosseto
  • Quentin Boesch
  • Elise Patole-Edoumba
  • Françoise Aubaile
  • Françoise Crozier
  • Eric Suzzoni
  • Sébastien Frangeul
  • Nicolas Bourgon
  • Alexandra Zachwieja
  • Tyler E. Dunn
  • Anne-Marie Bacon
  • Jean-Jacques Hublin
  • Laura Shackelford

The timing of the first arrival of Homo sapiens in East Asia from Africa and the degree to which they interbred with or replaced local archaic populations is controversial. Previous discoveries from Tam Pà Ling cave (Laos) identified H. sapiens in Southeast Asia by at least 46 kyr. We report on a recently discovered frontal bone (TPL 6) and tibial fragment (TPL 7) found in the deepest layers of TPL. Bayesian modeling of luminescence dating of sediments and U-series and combined U-series-ESR dating of mammalian teeth reveals a depositional sequence spanning ~86 kyr. TPL 6 confirms the presence of H. sapiens by 70 ± 3 kyr, and TPL 7 extends this range to 77 ± 9 kyr, supporting an early dispersal of H. sapiens into Southeast Asia. Geometric morphometric analyses of TPL 6 suggest descent from a gracile immigrant population rather than evolution from or admixture with local archaic populations.

Original languageEnglish
Article number3193
JournalNature Communications
Volume14
Number of pages21
ISSN2041-1723
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 2023

Bibliographical note

Publisher Copyright:
© 2023, The Author(s).

ID: 357838338