The Discoverer of the Denisovan Human: to the Anniversary of Academician Anatoly Panteleevich Derevianko

Abstract

For more than six decades, the scientific director of the Institute of Archaeology and Ethnography of the SB RAS, Academician of the Russian Academy of Sciences Anatoly Panteleevich Derevianko devoted to studying the problems of the Ancient Stone Age of Asia and America, the initial human settlement of the Euro-Asian subcontinent, chronostratigraphy and correlation of Paleolithic cultures in arid zones of Eurasia, reconstruction of the ancient history of the Far East from the Paleolithic era to the Early Middle Ages. The article focuses on his outstanding achievements in the organization and development of Russian historical science, an invaluable contribution to the study of the ancient history of mankind, the creation of the leading Russian scientific school of archaeologists, the preservation and popularization of the historical and cultural heritage of the country, a huge contribution to the study of the historical past of Siberia and the Russian Far East. Joint research with paleogeneticists and anthropologists of human remains aged approx. The 50 thousand years obtained during the expedition work led by A. P. Derevianko made it possible to substantiate the existence of a previously unknown to science population of a fossil human called Homo denisovan (Denisovan human).