DNA Study Yields Clues on First Migration of Early Humans By
NICHOLAS WADE Published: May 13, 2005 By studying the DNA of an
ancient people in Malaysia, a team of geneticists says it has
illuminated many aspects of how modern humans migrated from
Africa. The geneticists say there was only one migration of
modern humans out of Africa; that it took a southern route to
India, Southeast Asia and Australia; and that it consisted of a
single band of hunter-gatherers, probably just a few hundred
people strong. Because these events occurred in the last Ice
Age, when Europe was at first too cold for human habitation, the
researchers say, it was populated only later, not directly from
Africa but as an offshoot of the southern migration. The people
of this offshoot would presumably have trekked back through the
lands that are now India and Iran to reach the Near East and
Europe. The findings depend on analysis of mitochondrial DNA, a
type of genetic material inherited solely through the female
line. They are reported to