A recent study from 2021 found that an ancient Holocene hunter-gatherer from South Sulawesi had ancestry from both a distinct lineage related to modern Papuans and Aboriginal Australians and from the East-Eurasian lineage (represented by modern East Asians). The hunter-gatherer individual had approximately ~50% "Basal-East Asian" ancestry, and was positioned in between modern East Asians and Papuans of Oceania. The authors concluded that East Asian-related ancestry expanded much earlier into Maritime Southeast Asia than previously suggested, long before the expansion of Austroasiatic and Austronesian groups.
