Immunospecificity of albumin detected in 1.6 million-year-old fossils from Venta Micena in Orce, Granada, Spain

Abstract

The Orce skull fragment from southern Spain, dated at 1.6 Myr, has been a subject of heated controversy since it was first discovered in 1982. If it is hominid, as its discoverers contend, it is by far the oldest fossil hominid yet found in western Europe and implies that human populations settled this region much earlier than was previously realized. Numerous stone artifacts found at the Orce sites provide evidence that hominids were indeed present there in the Lower Pleistocene. Some paleontologists maintain that the 8 cm diameter occipital fragment is from a horse, not a hominid. Two independent investigations of the residual proteins in the skull were undertaken, one at the University of Granada in Spain, the other at the University of California, San Francisco. Two immunological methods of comparable sensitivity were employed for detection and species attribution of protein extracted from fossil bone: the Granada team used an enzyme-linked-immunosorbent assay (ELISA), and the UCSF team used a radioimmunoassay (RIA). Both teams obtained reactions characteristic of human albumin in the Orce skull and horse albumin in some of the horse fossils. These results support the lithic evidence that hominids were living in Andalusia 1.6 million years ago.

Species-specific albumin in fossil bones from Orce, Granada, Spain

“…This amount was expressed as ng-equivalents (Borja et al, 1997). This amount was expressed as ng-equivalents (Borja et al, 1997).…”

Radiographical study of skull fragment of Venta Micena (VM-0) (Orce, Granada Spain)

“…As we indicate at the beginning the studies supporting the Homo affinity of the "Orce Skull" (VM-0), especially in the paleoimmunologic studies (Garcia-Olivares et al 1989, Lowenstein 1995and Borja et al 1997. But we consider that this radiographical study prove definitively the mistake made by Agusti, Moy~-Solh and K6hler, when they indicate a coronalis suture in VM-0.…”

Two Deciduous Human Molars from the Early Pleistocene Deposits of Barranco León (Orce, Spain)

“…0011-3204/2015/5601-0007$10.00. DOI: 10.1086/ 679615 tools at the sites of Barranco Leó n and Fuentenueva 3 (Gibert et al 1998b), and fragmentary human remains at Barranco Leó n and at the stratigraphically lower site of Venta Micenathe latter have been a matter of dispute, being supported by some authors (e.g., Aguirre 2008;Borja et al 1997;Campillo et al 2003Campillo et al , 2006Coppens 1992;Gibert and Palmqvist 1995;Gibert et al 1989aGibert et al , 1989bGibert et al , 1998aGibert et al , 2006aGibert et al , 2006bLowenstein, Borja, and García-Olivares 1999;Martínez-Navarro 1996;Sánchez et al 1999;Tobias 1998;Torres, Borja, and García-Olivares 2002) and rejected by others (e.g., Martínez-Navarro 2002; Moyà and Agustí 1989;Moyà and Köhler 1997;Palmqvist et al 2005).…”