BarcelonaIt is certain that the first humans appeared in Africa between six and seven million years ago, and that they gradually began the process of evolution and migration to other regions. The approximate date of their arrival in Eurasia is between 2 million and 1 million years ago, but precise dating has been difficult due to the scarcity of archaeological sites from this period (part of the Paleolithic). But the magazine this Wednesday nature A study conducted by a team of researchers was published at the archaeological site of Korolevu in western Ukraine. Many artifacts have been found dating back 1.4 million years, which constitute the first evidence of the arrival of humans in Europe. The discovery is the first reliably dated evidence of human presence in Eurasia and sheds light on the direction of travel of this species.
The site of Korolevu occupies a key geographic area between the Caucasus and southwestern Europe, regions occupied by humans about 1.8 million and 1.2 million years ago, respectively. Korolevu has provided Paleolithic tools since the 1970s and is one of the northernmost Early Paleolithic sites. Roman Garba, a researcher at the Institute of Archeology of the Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic, and his colleagues analyzed the results and, using techniques such as core dissociation, arrived at the exact age of the Korolevu deposits.
Cosmic radiation analysis
The methodology used is based on the fact that radioactive atoms present in geological and biological materials (carbon) tend to disintegrate spontaneously over time at a constant rate. Therefore, the analysis was a study of the exposure of these instruments to cosmic radiation using this methodology, which allows studying the decay of some radioactive atoms (known as cosmic nuclides) that are formed when cosmic rays interact with materials in the atmosphere or atmosphere. The earth's surface.
The authors also studied habitat suitability in the past two million years, and believe that early humans took advantage of warmer glacial periods to colonize higher latitude sites, such as Korolevu. They also concluded that the dating places the Ukrainian site at an intermediate point temporally and spatially, strengthening the hypothesis that Europe was colonized from east to west.
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