Covid-19 has changed the world and our lives to a great extent, including the way paleoanthropologists, archaeologists and other researchers who need to work in the field. Still, scientists have made many crucial and exciting new discoveries in 2020 that are of great significance to the study of human origins.
Footprint fossils reveal where and how modern humans migrated
Three studies of fossilized human footprints published in 2020 revealed a lot of new information, such as where ancient humans went and how they moved in droves. Unlike physical fossils, footprints (and other "relic fossils") present more like a scene at a certain point in time, or at a very short time interval.
One
In December 2020, Matthew R. Bennett and colleagues published the longest fossil footprint of human footprint ever found. The footprint was formed about 11,500 to 13,000 years ago and is about 1.3 kilometers long, equivalent to the length of 14 football fields. The footprints were left behind by a woman or adolescent male, holding a two- or three-year-old child in her hands, in a rugged and dangerous terrain.

It is part of a fossil section of human footprints left over from 115,000 to 13,000 years ago. It can be seen that the person who left the footprints has gone back and forth. The middle photo contains footprints left by a child.
How do we get this information? It can be seen from the footprints that the footprints of adults will pause from time to time, waiting for the footprints of young children to catch up and intersect with them. The lines of the footprints are straight and clear, which shows that the walking speed is very fast, indicating that the person is going straight to a clear goal. Then, the footprints turned around and walked back, but this time there were no young children to accompany them.
So, did Pleistocene humans always act alone like this? The answer, of course, is no.
Two
In May 2020, Kevin Hatara et al. of Chatham University published the results of an analysis of Africa's largest fossil footprint population. About 6,000 to 19,000 years ago, a group of modern humans walked through a mudslide at the foot of Mount Lungai in Tanzania, leaving a total of 408 footprints by 17 people. Not only did these footprints help us understand their height and weight, but the team also used modern human foot size data to perform a statistical analysis that the group of humans may contain 14 women and 2 men. The team compared the results of these analyses with ethnographic data from modern ethnic groups such as the Haza in Tanzania and concluded that the footprints may have been left by adult women during a food gathering, during which several adult men occasionally visited or accompanied them.
Three
Footprints can also tell us that in some of the no-man's lands we previously thought were, humans have actually set foot in some places. Michael Petraglia of the Max Planck Institute for The Science of Human History and colleagues found 120,000-year-old human and animal footprints on the surface of an ancient lake in the Saudi Arabian desert. Prior to this, the earliest evidence of human access to the Arabian hinterland dates only 85,000 years ago.
Fossils show that ancient primates also traveled long distances
While these discoveries, which are directly related to the evolutionary history of humans, are important, they are just as exciting to study the history of the survival, reproduction, and migration of now extinct primates around the world.
Four
Three newly discovered fossils of the middle monkey show that the monkey lived in Asia at a similar time as an ape.
In October 2020, a research team led by Nina Gablonsky of Pennsylvania State University and Ji Xueping of the Institute of Antiquities and Archaeology of Yunnan Province in China discovered three new Chinese monkey fossils in Yunnan Province, formed in the Late Miocene of the Tertiary Period about 6.4 million years ago. These fossils suggest that the monkey lived in Asia for a similar period to that of apes. The monkey can adapt to a variety of different ecological environments. Modern Asian colobus monkeys may be their descendants, and the apparent seasonal variations and extreme conditions in their habitat suggest that they also continue this tendency.
Five
Speaking of extremes, the researchers found that monkeys may have "propped up a bamboo raft" and floated across the Atlantic. In April 2020, Eric Seifert of the University of Southern California and colleagues announced the discovery of a completely new monkey species the size of a can. They found four fossil teeth in the Amazon rainforest of Peru. The newly discovered monkey species, called Ucayalipithecus perdita, belongs to the now-extinct primate family of paraapithecids in Africa. Today, parapithecids are the third mammal to successfully complete a transatlantic journey of more than 900 miles (about 1440 kilometers) from Africa to South America. They are most likely to cross the ocean on plants that break in a storm on the coast. It may sound incredible, but as long as there is enough food (such as fruit growing on plants), monkeys can survive even without fresh water.
Six
In September 2020, a team of researchers led by Christopher C. Gilbert of Hunter University announced the discovery of another new molar fossil of the primate Kapi ramnagarensis in northern India, formed about 13 million years ago. The discovery pushes the fossil record of gibbons forward another five million years or so, and reflects an important message: The ancestors of modern gibbons migrated from Africa to Asia at about the same time as ancient great apes.
New paleoanthropological fossils have been found at the Delhi Møren Archaeological Site in South Africa
But all the important discoveries related to human evolution are inseparable from the fossil evidence left by ancient humans. In this regard, the Delhi Mörren Archaeological Site in South Africa is undoubtedly the biggest winner for 2020.
Seven
First, in July 2020, a research team led by Andy IR Herris of la Trobe University announced the discovery of two new fossils of Paranthropus robustus (DNH 152) and Homo erectus (DNH 134), formed about 2.04 million years ago and 1.95 million years ago, respectively, which are the oldest fossil records of these two ancient humans. The discovery suggests that these two ancient humans lived at the same time as australopithecus australopithecus in Africa. The fossil, numbered DNH 134, pushes the origin of Homo erectus forward by another 150,000 to 200,000 years.
The work of paleoanthropologists is not simple. When the DNH 143 fossil was discovered in 2015, Jesse Martin and Angelina Lis were students at the Drimeran Archaeological Site, responsible for cleaning and restoring the skulls of ancient humans. They were responsible for a sample of more than 150 tablets, all from a young child around three years old. When processing the sample, they could not cough, sneeze, talk, or even breathe carefully, for up to 40 minutes at a time.
Eight
The archaeological remains of Drimeron seem to be a place of treasure, constantly "gifting" us with new fossils. In 2018, the team found two new fossils, including a 2 million-year-old adult male skull, designated DNH 155. An analysis by Jesse Martin of la Trobe University, published in November 2020, deliberately compared the fossil with the fossils of adult male Roebacean found in Drimeron and other sites in South Africa, and found that some of the differences previously attributed to gender differentiation were actually the result of the "micro-evolution" of this early paleontology affected by ecological changes.
Scientists have discovered Denisovan DNA in cave sediments and in modern humans
Let's go back to the theme of "migration". (Staying at home for so long, everyone should miss the feeling of being able to play around, right?) ）
Nine
Last October, scientists first found definitive evidence of denisovans on the Tibetan Plateau, 1,740 miles from the Denisova Caves in Siberia, making it one of the biggest pieces of news in 2020. Decades ago, a Buddhist monk found a broken jaw bone in a cave in Baishiya, Gansu, about 160,000 years ago. There is a hypothesis that this jawbone may be the remains of the Denisovans. A research team led by Zhang Dongju of Lanzhou University verified this hypothesis. First, in 2019, they used a new technique based on protein variations to determine that this jawbone really belonged to Denisovans. But because the technique is too new and the exact location of the jawbone when it was found in the cave is unclear, the hypothesis remains skeptical. Determined to find more evidence, Zhang Dongju's team returned to the cave and conducted further investigations. To avoid being disturbed by worshippers, they only carry out excavations at night in winter. They managed to find the mitochondrial DNA of the Denisovans in cave sediments, 100,000 to 60,000 years old, and perhaps even as little as 45,000 years. In addition, they found charcoal, stone tools, and fossilized animal bones in the remains of fire left by the Denisovans in caves.
Ten
An analysis of a 34,000-year-old female skull revealed that it contained both Neanderthal and Denisovan DNA.
Also in October 2020, a team of researchers led by Svante Pabbo and DiandaMahilani of the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology analyzed a 34,000-year-old modern female skull discovered by miners in 2006 (the only known Pleistocene human fossil from Mongolia). And a modern human male skull excavated from a Chinese pastoral cave with a history of about 40,000 years. It turned out that both skull fossils contained NEanderthal and Denisovan DNA. The significance of this discovery is quite complicated, because the Dna sequences of Denisovans found in these two fossils do not exist in modern Oceanians (including Australian Aborigines and New Guineans), but modern East Asians have these DNA sequences, indicating that modern humans must have exchanged genes with two different Groups of Denisovans, one living in Southeast Asia and one in the Asian continent. This means that the Denisovans once occupied a considerable area in Asia. Next, scientists may be able to find more Denisowa fossils.
During this time, museums around the world are also advancing digitization projects to enable scientists to study the collections of museums during the pandemic. For example, the National Museum of Kenya and the Smithsonian Institution in the United States have been working to present fossils in 3D for researchers around the world to conduct research. If you miss visiting a museum, you can see the fossils this way without leaving your home. While looking forward to more Denisovan fossils, you can also use virtual reality technology to see the world "through" Neanderthal eyes, and even "get up close" with mammoths.