Scientists have identified a long-lost group of hunter-gatherers who vanished from Colombia’s highlands 2,000 years ago, reshaping our understanding of ancient human migrations in South America.
A groundbreaking DNA analysis has revealed traces of a previously unknown indigenous population that lived in what is now Colombia—and vanished thousands of years ago without leaving a genetic legacy. The findings, published in Science Advances, suggest a complete population turnover in the Colombian Andes, where today’s capital, Bogotá, now stands.
Researchers analyzed ancient DNA from 21 human skeletons unearthed at five archaeological sites on the Altiplano Cundiboyacense, a high plateau in central Colombia. These included samples from different time periods, ranging from early hunter-gatherers who lived 6,000 years ago to more recent indigenous groups from just over 500 years ago.
The study found that the earliest group—hunter-gatherers who inhabited the Checua site 6,000 years ago—had unique genetic signatures that disappeared entirely around 4,000 years ago. “We have not been able to find any descendants of these early hunter-gatherers from the Colombian Highlands,” researchers noted. “That means there has been a complete population exchange around Bogotá.”
Later populations, including those from the Herrera and Muisca cultures, show genetic ties to groups that likely migrated from Central America, bringing with them new technologies such as ceramics. This suggests a major cultural and demographic shift took place between 6,000 and 2,000 years ago.
The Herrera period, beginning around 2,800 years ago, saw the rise of pottery and more complex settlement patterns. However, how these innovations reached the highlands had remained unclear until now. The genetic evidence strongly supports the theory that migrating populations introduced these cultural changes—replacing the earlier indigenous group entirely.
This study not only uncovers a lost chapter of human history in South America but also challenges long-held assumptions about cultural continuity among indigenous communities in the Andes.
President of the Republic of Azerbaijan Ilham Aliyev welcomed a Croatian delegation led by Gordan Jandroković, Speaker of the Croatian Parliament, ma...
A new stage of economic transformation is under way in Karakalpakstan, where authorities have announced 27 large-scale projects worth nearly $2 billio...
The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences announced that the 2025 Nobel Prize in Chemistry has been awarded to Susumu Kitagawa of Kyoto University, Richar...
Czech Republic election winner ANO hopes to conclude negotiations with two small parties on forming a new government by the beginning of November, par...
Hamas said on Wednesday (8 October) it had exchanged a list of the names of Israeli hostages and Palestinian prisoners to be released under a swap dea...
President of the Republic of Azerbaijan Ilham Aliyev welcomed a Croatian delegation led by Gordan Jandroković, Speaker of the Croatian Parliament, marking his first official visit to Azerbaijan.
A new stage of economic transformation is under way in Karakalpakstan, where authorities have announced 27 large-scale projects worth nearly $2 billion with an aim to boost growth in the region.
The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences announced that the 2025 Nobel Prize in Chemistry has been awarded to Susumu Kitagawa of Kyoto University, Richard Robson of the University of Melbourne, and Omar Yaghi of the University of California.
Four people have been confirmed dead after a six-storey building collapsed in central Madrid while being converted into a hotel, authorities said, following a 15-hour rescue effort involving drones and sniffer dogs.
Video from the USGS (United States Geological Survey) showed on Friday (19 September) the Kilauea volcano in Hawaii erupting and spewing lava.
At least eight people have died and more than 90 others were injured following a catastrophic gas tanker explosion on a major highway in Mexico City’s Iztapalapa district on Wednesday, authorities confirmed.
At least 69 people have died and almost 150 injured following a powerful 6.9-magnitude earthquake off the coast of Cebu City in the central Visayas region of the Philippines, officials said, making it one of the country’s deadliest disasters this year.
A powerful 7.4-magnitude earthquake struck off Russia’s Kamchatka Peninsula on 13 September with no tsunami threat, coming just weeks after the region endured a devastating 8.8-magnitude quake — the strongest since 1952.
Authorities in California have identified the dismembered body discovered in a Tesla registered to singer D4vd as 15-year-old Celeste Rivas Hernandez, who had been missing from Lake Elsinore since April 2024.
The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences announced that the 2025 Nobel Prize in Chemistry has been awarded to Susumu Kitagawa of Kyoto University, Richard Robson of the University of Melbourne, and Omar Yaghi of the University of California.
The 2025 Nobel Prize in Physics has been awarded to John Clarke, Michel H. Devoret, and John M. Martinis for their groundbreaking discovery of macroscopic quantum mechanical tunnelling and energy quantisation in electric circuits.
United States chipmaker AMD will supply artificial intelligence chips to OpenAI in a multi-year agreement that could generate tens of billions of dollars in annual revenue and give the ChatGPT maker the option to acquire up to 10% of the company.
The Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine 2025 has been awarded jointly to Mary E. Brunkow, Fred Ramsdell, and Shimon Sakaguchi for their ground breaking discoveries on peripheral immune tolerance.
Swiss researchers are developing biocomputers made from living cells, aiming to merge biology and computing in an energy-efficient system once confined to science fiction.
You can download the AnewZ application from Play Store and the App Store.
What is your opinion on this topic?
Leave the first comment