DNA extracted from the arm bone of a child who died in southern Siberia about 24,000 years ago has shed light on the origins of the first people to colonise the Americas many thousands of years before Christopher Columbus.
Scientists believe that the child belonged to a group of ancient Siberians who were the ancestors of the first Americans. Many scholars had thought that native Americans were descended solely from East Asians but now western Eurasians have been added to the mix.
Part of the child’s DNA sequence is shared only with the DNA of modern-day native Americans, and not with modern-day East Asians, indicating that a group of long-gone Siberians must have played a key role in colonising the Americas.
Read the full, original story here: First people to colonise the Americas before Christopher Columbus are linked to Europe by new DNA discovery
