Karin Bojs: A yeti that was on really

Update 2019-05-03 14.58: the Article has been added to a correction.

the Legend of the Yeti have been told for hundreds of years of sherpor and the other on the tibetan highlands. In the early 1900s, the spread of the Yeti myth to västlandet, in connection with that it was a modern mandomsprov to climb the high mountains.

Bergsbestigarna from the west usually receive extensive assistance of local talent. Many people from the tibetan highlands has a genetic advantage in order to climb mountains. They carry a genetic variant, called EPAS1, which affects the oxygen uptake and not as easily as other people affected by höghöjdssjuka.

the scientists show that the tibetans have inherited this particular genetic variant from Denisovamänniskor. It was so far the clearest evidence that modern humans really have inherited a specific trait from another character.

Although all have derived from regions outside Africa have inherited a couple of per cent Neanderthal dna, which among other things affects the immune system, pigment and digestion, but so long is the relationships more vague.

Denisovamänniskan was used by neanderthal man more eastern cousin. It was discovered for the first time ten years ago in Denisovagrottan in the altai mountains in southern Siberia, by a research team led by Swedish-born Svante Pääbo.

from a small girl could Pääbo and his colleagues show, with dna analysis, that the girl belonged to a previously unknown group of people.

It was at the time very new to determine the a person with the help of dna. All previous data on the homininers relationship has been based on researchers are investigating how bones and teeth.

Since the first the little finger were analysed, scientists have found a further few teeth and bits of bone in the same siberian cave. But basically the only thing they can say about the look is that Denisovamänniskan seems to have been strongly built, with unusually large and sharp teeth.

Baishiya karst cave, where the jaw was found, used by the buddhists and is also a famous tourist destination. Photo: Dongju Zhang, Lanzhou University

presented for the first time, a bargain of Denisovamänniskan from a completely different place. And not just any place at any time, without a cave at 3,200 meters altitude in the tibetan province of Gansu in China.

It is about a lower jaw with several teeth. It was found already in the 1950s by a monk, who visited the cave in order to meditate. He handed over the jaw to a Buddha which, in turn, left it to a university. A few years ago began the chinese researchers collaborating with Jean-Jacques Hublin in Leipzig about the find. Now they report their findings in the journal Nature.

Something in the dna, the researchers have not been able to extract. But instead they have successful get out protein from the teeth, as they have analysed and compared. To use protein instead of dna is a new method, which, for the first time used on people.

Now then, are new technology, which can work on remains, which is very old or has been in a warm and moist environment where the dna is quickly broken down.

View over the whole valley of the river Jiangla, where the cave is located. Photo: Dongju Zhang, Lanzhou University

in Leipzig for a couple of months ago. Then, he pointed out that ”Denisovagrottan may be the center of the world for contemporary paleontologists, but for the passage of people, it was probably rather distant suburbs”.

at Least as interesting to examine is the tibetan highlands, east Asia, and not least in Melanesia, where the dna analysis of living people shows that the Denisovamänniskan left a legacy as late as about 14,000 years ago. With the new proteinmetoden have the chances improved to such analyses to be successful. Hublin and his colleagues are already in.

the Present-day tibetans likely got its elements of the Denisova for 30,000–40,000 years ago, when they first arrived to the high mountains. You can fantasize about how the meetings went. And you can brood over how long the Denisovamännisorna was left in the mountains, and in the extent to which they gave rise to the myth of the Yeti. But then we have left science domains.

Correction: the Cave where the hoard from Denisovamänniskan found is at 3,200 meters altitude.