Unknown Human Ancestor Identified by Artificial Intelligence
By combining deep learning algorithms and statistical methods, researchers have identified, in the genome of Asiatic individuals, the footprint of a new hominid who cross bred with its ancestors tens of thousands of years ago.
Credit: Center for Genomic Regulation
By combining deep learning algorithms and statistical methods, investigators from the Institute of Evolutionary Biology (IBE), the Centro Nacional de Análisis Genómico (CNAG-CRG) of the Centre for Genomic Regulation (CRG) and the Institute of Genomics at the University of Tartu have identified, in the genome of Asiatic individuals, the footprint of a new hominid who cross bred with its ancestors tens of thousands of years ago.
Modern human DNA computational analysis suggests that the extinct species was a hybrid of Neanderthals and Denisovans and cross bred with Out of Africa modern humans in Asia. This finding would explain that the hybrid found this summer in the caves of Denisova–the offspring of a Neanderthal mother and a Denisovan father–, was not an isolated case, but rather was part of a more general introgression process.
The study, published in Nature Communications, uses deep learning for the first time ever to account for human evolution, paving the way for the application of this technology in other questions in biology, genomics and evolution.
One of the ways of distinguishing between two species is that while both of them may cross breed, they do not generally produce fertile descendants. However, this concept is much more complex when extinct species are involved. In fact, the story told by current human DNA blurs the lines of these limits, preserving fragments of hominids from other species, such as the Neanderthals and the Denisovans, who coexisted with modern humans more than 40,000 years ago in Eurasia.
Credit: Center for Genomic Regulation
It is the first time that deep learning has been used successfully to explain human history, paving the way for this technology to be applied in other questions in biology, genomics and evolution.
An extinct hominid could explain the history of humankind
The deep learning analysis has revealed that the extinct hominid is probably a descendant of the Neanderthal and Denisovan populations. The discovery of a fossil with these characteristics this summer would seem to endorse the study finding, consolidating the hypothesis of this third species or population that coexisted with modern human beings and mated with them. “Our theory coincides with the hybrid specimen discovered recently in Denisova, although as yet we cannot rule out other possibilities”, said Mayukh Mondal, an investigator of the University of Tartu and former investigator at the IBE.
Contacts and sources:
Laia Cendrós Ollé
Citation: Approximate Bayesian computation with deep learning supports a third archaic introgression in Asia and Oceania.
Mayukh Mondal, Jaume Bertranpetit, Oscar Lao. Nature Communications, 2019; 10 (1) DOI: 10.1038/s41467-018-08089-7
Source: http://www.ineffableisland.com/2019/01/unknown-human-ancestor-identified-by.html
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