A groundbreaking proteomic analysis of hominin femur fragments recovered from the Tapti Basin in Central India has identified a distinctive Middle Pleistocene lineage. Researchers from the Max Planck Institute utilized advanced mass spectrometry to extract and sequence ancient proteins from the 220,000-year-old samples. The results indicate that this population possessed unique protein structures related to muscle metabolism and skeletal density that distinguish them from both Homo erectus and Denisovans.
This study provides the first molecular evidence of a geographically isolated hominin group in the Indian subcontinent that adapted specifically to the humid-subtropical environment of the Tapti-Narmada corridor. The discovery of this lineage, tentatively named the Tapti Hominin, suggests that South Asia was a major hub of human evolution during the Middle Pleistocene, hosting diverse populations with specialized physiological traits. The findings are published in the Proceedings of the Paleontological Academy.