How does genetic research being done in China figure in the story of early human migrations?
The earliest clear evidence for the permanent movement of modern humans outside of Africa comes not from Europe or even from the Middle East. It comes instead from northern Australia. Sometime after 100,000 years ago, modern humans left Africa probably crossing the Red Sea from the Horn and began making their way along the shoreline of southern Asia. By about 60,000 years ago the dating is still uncertain modern humans had sailed from the tip of southeastern Asia to Australia. From there, they began to make their way north into eastern Asia, again with no evidence for interbreeding with the archaic humans already present in Asia. Once established in eastern Asia, modern humans began to meet and mix with their counterparts who had come from Africa into western Asia. All of these movements and many more can be traced in the genes of the people living in Asia today. I spent several days in Shanghai with a Chinese geneticist who has studied the Y chromosomes of more than 10,000 Chinese men
