At present a Brazilian study involving a large collection of South American skulls suggests at least two distinct groups of early humans colonized the Americas. The two anthropologists of the University of Sao Paulo Walter Neves and Mark Hubbe studied 81 skulls of early humans and found them to be different from both modern and ancient Native Americans. So, the 7,500- to 11,000-year-old remains suggest the oldest settlers of the Americas came from different genetic stock than more recent Native Americans. The researchers said that modern Native Americans share traits with Mongoloid peoples of Mongolia, China, and Siberia. But now they are found dozens of skulls from Brazil appear much more similar to modern Australians, Melanesians, and Sub-Saharan Africans. The study is described in this week's online edition of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

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