Theory on South Asia Migration Contradicted by University of Huddersfield Study

A study published Monday in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences journal could overturn a significant idea as to when humans migrated to Asia, LiveScience.com reported.

The study suggests, based on archaeological and genetic data, that humans left Africa for South Asia around 55,000 to 60,000 years ago, long after the mega-eruption of Mount Toba, around 74,000 years ago.

The study contradicts an old belief among some archaeologists and researchers that humans had been in the region for twice that long.

"The ash from the eruption, which was an absolutely huge eruption, blew across all of India and smothered the whole region in ash," said Martin Richards, an archaeogeneticist at the University of Huddersfield in the United Kingdom and co-author of the study. "Modern humans weren't there when that happened. They arrived afterwards."

Scientists previously believed humans had migrated to the part of Asia known today as southeast India about 130,000 years ago, before the volcano eruption. Researchers believed tools found buried in the ash in southeast India from the eruption resembled tools used by modern men in Africa.

Richards and his team found the tools did not match and that Neanderthals, or archaic humans, had possibly made the tools found beneath the ash.

The research team also analyzed mitochondrial DNA from 817 samples carried in the cytoplasm of the egg from the maternal line. The genetic data suggests the later travel date: after the eruption, not before it.

"This paper provides a persuasively argued case that the Out of Africa movement took place around 60,000 years ago - that is after the Toba eruption event," Jim Wilson, a population geneticist at the University of Edinburgh in the U.K., said in an email.

The genetic data also suggests the people arrived on the western coast and moved inland as their population spread. Wilson, who was not involved in the study, said the discovery was important for understanding the history of mankind.

"The findings are important for understanding the history of all humanity, given that southern Asia is on the route from Africa to East Asia, Southeast Asia, Australasia and the Americas," he said.