Modern humans never shared habitats with Homo erectus

Researchers, after analysing new excavations in Indonesia, have claimed that modern humans never co-existed with Homo erectus.

The research offers new insights into the nature of human evolution, suggesting a different role for Homo erectus than had been previously thought.

The work was conducted by the Solo River Terrace (SoRT) Project, an international group of scientists directed by anthropologists Etty Indriati of Gadjah Mada University in Indonesia and Susan Anton of New York University.

Homo erectus is widely considered a direct human ancestor, it resembles modern humans in many respects, except for its smaller brain and differently shaped skull, and was the first of our ancestors to migrate out of Africa, approximately 1.8 million years ago.

Homo erectus went extinct in Africa and much of Asia by about 500,000 years ago, but appeared to have survived in Indonesia until about 35,000 to 50,000 years ago at the site of Ngandong on the Solo River.

These late members of Homo erectus would have shared the environment with early members of our own species, Homo sapiens, who arrived in Indonesia by about 40,000 years ago.

The existence of the two species simultaneously has important implications for models about the origins of modern humans.

One of the models, the Out of Africa or replacement model, predicts such overlap.

However, findings by the SoRT Project show that Homo erectus' time in the region ended before modern humans arrived there.

The analyses suggest that Homo erectus was gone by at least 143,000 years ago—and likely by more than 550,000 years ago.

This means the demise of Homo erectus occurred long before the arrival of Homo sapiens.

"Thus, Homo erectus probably did not share habitats with modern humans," said Indriati.

The study was reported in the journal PLoS One.