Early modern humans and Neanderthals were close bedfellows.

Fossil evidence from one of the earliest modern humans in Europe shows the specimen shared between 6 and 9% of its genome with Neanderthals, the highest amount of any human sequenced to date, according to recent findings from researchers from the Max Planck Institute of Evolutionary Anthropology, Harvard Medical School and the Key Laboratory of Vertebrate Evolution and Human Origins in Beijing.

It’s all thanks to a jaw bone, dated between 37,000 and 42,000 years old, found in Oase Cave in western Romania in 2002. The site became known as "Pestera cu Oase", or the "Cave with Bones", and the jaw bone, which consists only of the lower mandible, was labeled “Oase 1.”

"The data from the jawbone (implies) that humans mixed with (Neanderthals) not just in the Middle East, but in Europe as well," said Institute of Vertebrate Paleontology and Paleoanthropology of Chinese Academy of Sciences’ Qiaomei Fu, one of the study’s lead researchers.

The international team’s findings were published in Nature. The team consisted of researchers from China, the U.S., Germany, Romania and Canada.

"Interestingly, the Oase individual does not seem to have any direct descendants in Europe today," said Harvard Medical School’s David Reich, who coordinated the population genetic analysis of the study. "It may be that he was part of an early migration of modern humans to Europe that interacted closely with (Neanderthals) but eventually became extinct."

According to the researchers, the findings suggest the specimen had a direct Neanderthal relative within four to six generations of his family tree.

Neanderthals are generally believed to have disappeared between 39,000 and 41,000 years ago, but they contributed 1 to 3% of the DNA in present-day people from Eurasia.

Researchers found the evidence from two DNA extracts, one 10 mg and the other 25 mg, of bone powder from Oase 1.

"This is the only interbreeding in Europe that we know of so far," said author Svante P？？bo to The Guardian. "It shows us … the very earliest modern humans that came to Europe really mixed with the local Neanderthals here. It’s not just something that happened early on when they came out of Africa."

According to the article, the only known location of interbreeding prior to this discovery was in the Middle East, or the surrounding area, and dated around 50,000 to 60,000 years ago.

Neanderthals, according to Current World Archaeology, are thought to have existed from around 250,000 to around 35,000 years ago. They “were expert hunters, they showed respect for their dead through burials and by at least 50,000 years ago had developed external signs of an aesthetic,” the article reads.

When the jaw bone was found in 2002, it was part of a much larger excavation. In addition, cavers and researchers found a human skull, and over 5,000 different bones, from dead bears and wolves to other animals. The “field work has produced one of the best documented cave bear sites in Europe,” according to Current World Archaeology.  

The research team hopes to obtain further data that can paint a picture of how early humans and Neanderthals interacted. (China Topix)