Neanderthal DNA may refute 65,000-year-old date for human occupation in Australia, but not all experts are convinced

Humans did not arrive in Australia 65,000 years ago, and likely didn’t reach the land down under until around 50,000 years ago, a controversial new paper reports.

The reasoning behind the finding is that modern humans didn’t mate with Neanderthals until around 50,000 years ago, but Indigenous Australians have a small percentage of Neanderthal DNA. So, the first Australians could not have arrived until after humans mated with Neanderthals.

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