Studies of DNA from living Africans, and from the 2,000-year-old African boy, so far indicate that at least several branches of Homo — some not yet identified by fossils — existed in Africa roughly 300,000 years ago, says paleoanthropologist John Hawks of the University of Wisconsin–Madison, a member of the H. naledi team who refrains from classifying Jebel Irhoud individuals as H. sapiens.
Office of Strategic Communication