Studying their DNA, the researchers found that the ancestors of Australian Aboriginals had split from the first modern human populations to leave Africa, 64,000 to 75,000 years ago. Dr Joe Dortch, a scientist at UWA, says the discovery turns on its head the existing theory that Aboriginals arrived here less than 50,000 years ago. The findings are detailed in the journal Science.
“[The discovery] strongly supports the idea that Aborigines were [part of] an early and separate wave of human expansion out of Africa, before the subsequent wave that established Europeans and Asians,” says Professor Alan Cooper, director of the Australian Centre for Ancient DNA at the University of Adelaide.
“However, while this is a major step forward, the key unresolved question remains the unique story of Aboriginal history within Australia.”
“This new DNA study powerfully confirms that Aboriginal Australians are one of the oldest living populations in the world, certainly the oldest outside of Africa,” agrees evolutionary biologist Professor Darren Curnoe of UNSW. “Australians are truly one of the world’s great human populations and a very ancient one at that, with deep connections to the Australian continent and broader Asian region. About this now there can be no dispute.”
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