Archaic Hominin Has a "Strange Mosaic".

PositionANTHROPOLOGY - Brief article

A relative of modern humans that lived at least 104,000 years ago showed evidence of dental growth and development very similar to that of people today a study in the journal Science Advances has found.

An international team of scientists performed the first systematic assessment of dental growth and development in an East Asian archaic hominin fossil that is known as the Xujiayao juvenile. The fossil is of a 6 1/2-year-old who lived between 104,000 and 248,000 years ago found at the Xujiayao site in northern China.

The researchers were surprised to find that, in most ways, this child's dental development was very similar to what you would find in a child today says anthropologist and study coauthor Debbie Guatelli-Steinberg.

Compared to our primate cousins, modern humans --including their teeth--take a long time to form and develop. Anthropologists believe this characteristic is associated with humans' longer periods of child dependency--how long a juvenile relies on support...

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