New species from Ethiopia further expands Middle Pliocene hominin diversity

A new hominin species, Australopithecus deyiremeda, which lived between 3.5 and 3.3 million years ago, at around the same time as species such as Au. afarensis (‘Lucy’), is discovered in Ethiopia; its morphology suggests that some dental features traditionally associated with later genera such as Paranthropus and Homo emerged earlier than previously thought.