Mysterious Human-Like Species Lived in a 'Lord of Rings-Type World'

When humans were first beginning to evolve, they had two extinct relatives--Neanderthals and an archaic human group called Denisovans. Now, though, new findings reveal that there may have been yet another and previously unknown group that bred with the Denisovans.

The researchers first discovered this unknown group by examining the genome sequences of both Neanderthals and Denisovans. The genomes suggested that interbreeding occurred between several human-like groups in both Europe and Asia more than 30,000 years ago--including the previously unknown group.

"What it begins to suggest is that we're looking at a 'Lord of the Rings'-type world-that there were many hominid populations," said Mark Thomas, an evolutionary geneticist and the University Collect London who was not involved in the study, in an interview with Nature.

In the past, researchers have found that modern humans have both Denisovan and Neanderthal DNA, suggesting that interbreeding occurred with modern humans. Yet this is the first time that scientists have found yet another hominid group. In fact, it's possible that there may be even more human-like groups out there, waiting to be discovered.

Currently, all that the researchers know about this ancient population was that it interbred with the Denisovans and originally came from Asia. It's also possible that the group could be related to Homo heidelbergensis, which is a species that left Africa about half a million years ago and later gave rise to the Neanderthals in Europe. It's possible that this species also journeyed to Asia and evolved into a different species there, as well.

The findings were presented at a meeting on ancient DNA at the Royal Society in London, and also published in the journal Nature.