How were the Denisovans recognised as a distinct human group?
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By their DNA
A single finger bone sufficed: the first human group ever defined not by the shape of bones but by its genome.
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Foto: Yuriy59 · CC BY-SA 3.0 · Wikimedia Commons
In which mountain range is the eponymous Denisova Cave?
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In the Altai Mountains of Siberia
The cave was occupied in turn by Denisovans, Neanderthals and modern humans: a unique archive, DNA included, thanks to the cold.
Foto: Thilo Parg · CC BY-SA 3.0 · Wikimedia Commons
Which tiny find yielded the first Denisovan genome in 2010?
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A finger bone
The tip of a little finger, probably a girl's. So unremarkable that nobody would have credited it with a new human group.
Where do people today carry the highest share of Denisovan ancestry?
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In Papua New Guinea and the Philippines
Among Papuans, other Melanesians and Aboriginal Australians, Denisovan ancestry makes up several percent of the genome; in 2021 the Ayta Magbukon of the Philippines turned out to carry even more. Denisovans must therefore have ranged far beyond Siberia.
Which adaptation of today's Tibetans comes from Denisovan genes?
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Tolerance of high altitude
The gene variant EPAS1 stops blood thickening dangerously in thin air. It demonstrably comes from Denisovans: inherited protection that still saves lives.
Where was the first larger Denisovan bone outside Siberia found?
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On the Tibetan Plateau
A jawbone from Baishiya Karst Cave at 3,280 metres, about 160,000 years old: identified not by DNA but by proteins in the tooth enamel.
What was special about the girl "Denny" from Denisova Cave?
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Her mother was a Neanderthal, her father a Denisovan
One bone splinter was enough to prove it: the first known first-generation child of two different human groups. She died at about 13.
Which human group are Denisovans most closely related to?
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The Neanderthals
Both lines separated from each other hundreds of thousands of years ago, after splitting jointly from our own line: sister groups, then.
How many Denisovan fossils are known so far?
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Only a handful
Teeth, finger bones, skull fragments, a jaw, a rib. Almost nothing is known about their appearance: reconstructions rest on chemical signatures in the genome.
How were Denisovans detected in cave layers containing no bones at all?
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Through DNA in the sediment
Genetic material filtered from soil reveals who occupied a cave and when; a method that has been transforming archaeology since 2017.
Where does Denisova Cave get its name?
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From a hermit named Denis
The Russian recluse is said to have lived there in the 18th century. So an entire human group is named after a man who came tens of thousands of years after them.
Since 2025 the Harbin skull counts as Denisovan. Which species name had it been given in 2021?
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Homo longi
Proteins from the bone and mitochondrial DNA from dental calculus linked the more than 146,000-year-old Harbin skull to the Denisovans in 2025. The group thus has its first skull and in Homo longi a name, though the naming is still debated.
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