![]() Naia’s skull shape and facial features are considered “Paleoamerican” and differ from native Americans living today in the Western Hemisphere. Whether all early inhabitants of the Americas came across the Bering land bridge or somehow migrated from elsewhere in the world remains a controversial question because of the differences in skull shape and facial features among prehistoric fossilized remains discovered across the Americas and modern-day indigenous populations. Those first migrants have been dubbed the Clovis people. The results show the girl is related, maternally at least, to today’s native Americans, meaning both would trace their lineage to Beringia - the land masses on either side of the ancient land bridge now covered by the Bering Sea that was used by prehistoric people to migrate from northeast Asia into what is now Alaska and southward into Central and South America. AP Photo/Roberto Chavez Arce via ScienceĭNA was extracted from one of Naia’s teeth and scientists sequenced what’s called mitochondrial DNA, which is passed from mother to child. Article contentīased on carbon-dating and other chronology testing, the researchers estimate “the small, slight” girl lived between 12,000 and 13,000 years ago. This advertisement has not loaded yet, but your article continues below. His role is studying microfossils, such as those of single-celled animals, and water salinity, within Hoyo Negro.īut beyond the stunning discovery of Naia’s skeletal remains in her watery grave, reported Thursday in the journal Science, is what DNA from her bones is telling researchers about the origins of the Western Hemisphere’s first peoples and their link to modern-day native Americans. ![]() “A big part of it has just been trying to map the locations of things and get the shape of the tunnels and cavern, and mapping locations of human bones and animal bones,” said Ed Reinhardt, a professor of geography and earth sciences at McMaster University in Hamilton who is part of the research team. ![]() and Canada was formed in 2011 to photograph and document the site, and to collect fossilized flora and fauna samples for testing. In a 50-metre-deep sinkhole within the cavern, the girl’s skull was resting on a boulder, “laying upside-down with a perfect set of teeth and dark eye sockets looking back at us,” said diver Alberto Nava.Īfter the divers reported their find to the National Institute of Anthropology and History in Mexico, a consortium of 16 scientists and cave explorers from Mexico, the U.S. Naia’s remains were discovered in 2007 by three Mexican cave divers exploring an underwater cavern, deep in the Yucatan jungle about eight kilometres from the Caribbean coast. “Perhaps seeking fresh water in the dark passages, animals and at least one human fell into this inescapable … trap.” Article content AP Photo/National Geographic, Paul NicklenĬhatters, the first scientist to study the prehistoric skeleton known as Kennewick Man that was found in Washington state in 1996, described Hoyo Negro as being like a miniature of California’s La Brea tar pits, “only without the tar and with considerably better preservation.”Īt the time of Naia’s death, the caves would have been dry and accessible, he told a media teleconference. ![]() Manage Print Subscription / Tax Receipt.
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