Hobbit new species Homo floresiensis not microcephalic person (2/5/2007)

In October 2004, Australian and Indonesian researchers discovered bones of the miniature humans in a cave on Flores, an island east of Bali between Asia and Australia. The original skeleton, a female, stood at just 3 feet 4 inches tall, weighed about 55 pounds, and was around 30 years old at the time of her death 18,000 years ago.

Peter Brown, a paleoanthropologist at the University of New England in New South Wales, Australia, co-author of the study describing the initial findings, concluded that the skeleton should be classified as a new human species, which he dubbed Homo floresiensis after the island on which it was found.

Within days of the studies publication, several other scientists said the conclusion was wrong, that the skeleton probably was a person suffering from microcephaly a rare neurological disorder in which the circumference of the head is significantly smaller than average for the person's age and sex.

To rebut the argument, Anthropologist Dean Falk with the Florida State University, leading an international team compared the Hobbit's skull to those of nine people with microcephaly. They concluded that the 3-foot-tall adult woman had a highly evolved brain, unlike that of a microcephalic person, confirming that she belongs to the proposed extinct species.

Though only a few remains were actually found, it is hoped that enough fossil evidence exists, so that a thorough DNA examination can be conducted. It may herald another genome project, similar to the Neanderthal Genome project.

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