Hobbit might have been human suffering from stunted growth
March 5th, 2008 - 1:10 pm ICT by adminLondon, March 5 (ANI): A new theory has emerged about the identity of the small human skeleton called Hobbit, found on the island of Flores in Indonesia, suggesting that it is not from a new species, but from a Homo sapiens with cretinism a condition in which a person is born with a deficient thyroid gland.
According to a report in Nature News, Peter Obendorf of RMIT University in Melbourne and his colleagues have determined that the cast images of the fossil shows an impression, called a fossa, of an enlarged pituitary gland at the base of the skull behind the nasal region.
This, they said, is evidence that the skeleton is not from a new species, called Homo floresiensis, but from a Homo sapiens with cretinism, in which people often have an enlarged pituitary gland as well as severely stunted growth and a small brain.
Since the discovery in 2003 of the skull and partial skeleton of Homo floresiensis , the anthropology community has sprouted numerous theories to explain its characteristics.
Just over 1 metre tall, the 18,000-year-old creature had a brain one-quarter the size of modern humans and primitive skeletal features similar to those of earlier human relatives. Stone tools have also been found in the same cave.
Though palaeoanthropologist Peter Brown and archaeologist Michael Morwood, both from the University of New England in Armidale, Australia, state that the skeleton is a new species, new evidence indicates it to be wrong.
Teuku Jacob, a palaeoanthropologist from Indonesia, initially analysed the bones and decided that the creature, known as the hobbit, was in fact a human who had a developmental disorder called microcephaly, in which the head is smaller than usual.
Last year, an Israeli team also published a report proposing that the hobbit had a growth disorder called Laron syndrome. (ANI)
- 'Hobbit' was 'iodine-deficient human, not another species' - Sep 29, 2010
- 'Hobbits' were normal, not malformed humans - Jun 28, 2010
- The "hobbit" evolved separate to humans - Jul 31, 2009
- 'Hobbit' a genuine ancient human species, say scientists - Nov 21, 2009
- Fossils of giant bird discovered on 'hobbit' island of Flores - Dec 08, 2010
- Humans and 'hobbits' may have existed together - Aug 04, 2009
- Hobbit may represent an entirely new species - Dec 18, 2008
- Hobbit's brain, though small, was souped up with complex intelligence - Apr 04, 2009
- 'Hobbits' were different from us, after all - Dec 18, 2008
- First-ever cast of Hobbit to be unveiled on April 21 - Mar 24, 2009
- 3D analysis indicates Hobbit was not human - Jan 21, 2009
- 'Hobbit' was a dwarf with large feet - May 07, 2009
- Geneticists to drill 18,000-year-old 'hobbit' tooth to extract DNA - Jan 06, 2011
- Two million year old skeletons discovered - Nov 18, 2011
- New study suggests earliest humans were not very different from us - Feb 15, 2011
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