Deep in a limestone cavern on Turkey’s Mediterranean coast, 2 really various sets of human beings Behind almost similar traces of their lives — comparable stone tools, the remains of the exact same victim animals, the exact same kinds of seashells pierced and strung into accessories. They might have been separated by countless years and might not have straight connected. The overlap in between them was striking enough that scientists studying the website had to look two times.

The website, Üçağızlı II, deals among the clearest examples of a quandary that researchers have actually long battled with: Neanderthals and modern-day people (Humankinddidn’t simply clash and go their different methods. They lived in the exact same locations, and, as lots of hereditary research studies have actually verified, made love, throughout 10s of countless years and on several continents. The DNA of almost everyone alive outdoors Africa today brings the evidence: Approximately 2% of the non-African genome is Neanderthal.

Olivia Maule is a previous Live Science intern and science reporter whose beats consist of area, biotechnology and the environment. She holds a B.A. in biology and a B.S. in sociology from the University of Florida and finished a master’s degree in science interaction at U.C. Santa Cruz. A 2025 AAAS Mass Media Fellow, she composed stories and produced videos throughout a summertime at El Nuevo Día, Puerto Rico’s biggest paper, and has actually composed for Eos, Mongabay, Science publication and Stanford Report. Olivia is a native Spanish and English speaker.