Latest Insular dwarfism Stories

Two studies reported on Wednesday argue that the 18,000-year-old fossil remains of tiny humans found in 2003 in the remote Indonesian island of Flores are indeed a new species, and not pygmies whose brains had withered with disease.Anthropologists have bitterly debated the identity and origins of these cave-dwelling relatives since the discovery of Homo floresiensis "“ often referred to as "the hobbit" due to its small size.Measuring roughly 3 feet tall and weighing 65 pounds, the...

Since the reporting of the so-called "hobbit" fossil from the island of Flores in Indonesia, debate has raged as to whether these remains are of modern humans (Homo sapiens), reduced, for some reason, in stature, or whether they represent a new species, Homo floresiensis. Reporting in this week's PLoS ONE in a study funded by the National Geographic Society Mission Programs, Lee Berger and colleagues from the University of the Witwatersrand, Rutgers University and Duke University, describe...