The human race will become extinct 930,000 years ago

There is currently no part of the planet that has not been affected – directly or indirectly – by human presence. the Homo sapiens It was found literally everywhere, while last November The world’s human population Arrived in 8,000,000,000 people.

However, according to research Science magazine reported on Thursday that our species is on the verge of completely disappearing from the face of the Earth.

For decades, scientists around the world have been trying to piece together our mysterious history, with the genes of modern humans as the key witness. The main thing they exploit is that every child is born carrying hundreds of genetic mutations, some of which can be passed on to future generations for thousands, even millions of years.

Thus, by comparing genetic differences in the DNA of different present-day populations, scientists can trace the genetic code back to ancient populations that lived in different parts of the world, moved and interbred with each other.

By examining a range of data to explain current genetic diversity among humans, researchers concluded that about 930,000 years ago, our ancestors were on the verge of extinction. “We realized we had made a major discovery about human history,” said Wangji Hu, a biologist at the Icahn School of Medicine in New York and a co-author of the study.

During that period, called the “bottleneck,” our species reached about 1,280 pairs of reproductive age (including children and the elderly, the total population was apparently slightly larger). This period lasted more than 100,000 years, with researchers estimating that the human race began to “raise” its numbers again about 813,000 years ago.

The possible reasons that led to this decline are mainly attributed to environmental changes. An extended ice age combined with long droughts may have made finding food very difficult at a time when there was no agriculture or animal husbandry.

Although some independent scientists argue that patterns of population decline during the period in question are not as global as they should be in the case of global climate change, and so the results of the research may ultimately be limited to a particular region, he and his team say that both fossils and geological data What they have collected from all over the world is powerful evidence.