1. The Journey Out of Africa
Migration
The Journey Out of Africa

2. Thousands of years ago, humans began leaving Africa...
The question is… when?
Human remains have been found in the Middle East that are 170,000 to 190,000 years old.
Most evidence indicates that humans left between 60,000 and 70,000 years ago
Human remains have been found in China that are about 120,000 years old.
Did they go back to Africa? Did they die out?

3. Why do we not know for certain?
Genetic information is giving us more than one story.
Maybe there were smaller migrations of humans 190, ,000 years ago, then the larger migration happened about 65,000 years ago OR
Maybe the 2% difference is the result of Homo Sapiens intermixing with other species, such as Homo neanderthalensis and the Denisovans
Papua New Guinea - 98% of population shows DNA from the humans that left 60-70,000 years ago. However, 2% shows DNA from an earlier group. Other studies show something similar -

4. Fossil Evidence:
A jawbone muscle found in Misliya Cave in Israel. It is 170,000 and 190,000 years old.

5. Homo Sapiens weren’t the only humans to leave Africa...
Notice Homo neaderthanlensis evolved outside of Africa. Modern humans evolved 300,000 years ago whereas Homo neaderthalensis evolved 400,000 years ago.
Map of the range of Homo neanderthalensis.

6. Map of Homo heidelbergensis.
Possibly our direct ancestor, although we don’t know who Homo heidelbergensis’ direct ancestor is.

7. Map of the range of Homo erectus.

9. What about the Americas?
Originally, people thought humans migrated over the Bering Strait, which was a land bridge (The Pacific Coast Migration Model, or PCMM)
There’s a split in East Asian and American DNA that happens about 25,000 years ago. Is that when future Native Americans migrated?
There’s also possible evidence that humans were here 100,000 years ago, rather than only 15,000 years ago.

10. Xach’itee’aanenh t’eede gaay or “Sunrise Child-Girl.”
11,500 year old remains of a 6 month old baby
half of her DNA came from the ancient Siberians, while the rest was split between that of current northern and southern Native Americans.
May be an ancestor of all Native Americans

11. But, what about the Clovis people?
Clovis spear points have been found in the Americas that are 13,500 years old.
There’s no evidence of Clovis tools near Alaska, and up the Canada coast.
Instead, there is evidence of similar, earlier tools in Chili.
Did early humans cross the Pacific instead, and migrate north?

12. So, early humans came to America by...
Crossing the land bridge connecting Siberia to Alaska, via the Bering Strait and walking down the ice corridor through Canada.

13. 2.) Humans crossed the Bering Strait land bridge, then used boats to travel down the Pacific Coast (PCM Model).

14. 3.) Humans crossed the Pacific Ocean by boat, island hopping through Polynesia.

15. What we know for sure… at the moment….
This dates are the latest these migrations could have happened