Skip to content
New research led by Max-Planck Institute of Geoanthropology and University of Cambridge scientists suggests malaria did more than sicken ancient populations, it steered where early humans could live, fragmenting groups and influencing the genetic map of our species.
Colucci et al. explored whether Plasmodium falciparum-induced malaria drove habitat choice in human societies 74,000 to 5,000 years ago.
“Malaria, caused by single-celled parasitic organisms of the genus Plasmodium, is a major world disease that today presents a global health problem, with 263 million cases annually,” said lead author Dr. Margherita Colucci and her colleagues.
“Genetic studies indicate that malaria was a major problem both in recent prehistory and also in the Pleistocene, with mutations relating to sickle cell anemia emerging in response to malaria between 25,000 and 22,000 years ago in Africa.”
“Archaeological studies have also identified earlier, indirect evidence for the measures that humans took to avoid exposure to the vectors of disease, for example, by topping plant bedding with aromatic leaves containing insecticidal and larvicidal chemicals.”
In their new study, the authors explored how Plasmodium falciparum-induced malaria shaped the history of our species in sub-Saharan Africa between 74,000 and 5,000 years ago.
They found that the disease influenced where early humans lived, pushing populations away from high-risk areas and spreading groups farther apart across the landscape.
Over tens of thousands of years, this fragmentation influenced how populations encountered one another, mixed, and exchanged genes, helping to shape the genetic structure of modern humans.
The findings suggest that malaria was not just a challenge for early humans, but a fundamental force shaping the deep history of our species.
“We used species distribution models of three major mosquito complexes together with paleoclimate models,” Dr. Colucci said.
“Combining these with epidemiological data allowed us to estimate malaria transmission risk across sub-Saharan Africa.”
The researchers then compared these estimates with an independent reconstruction of the human ecological niche across the same region and time period.
The results show that humans strongly avoided — or were unable to survive in — areas with high malaria transmission risk.
“The effects of these choices shaped human demography for the last 74,000 years, and likely much earlier,” said Professor Andrea Manica.
“By fragmenting human societies across the landscape, malaria contributed to the population structure we see today.”
“Climate and physical barriers were not the only forces shaping where human populations could live.”
“This study opens up new frontiers in research on human evolution,” added Professor Eleanor Scerri.
“Disease has rarely been considered a major factor shaping the earliest prehistory of our species, and without ancient DNA from these periods it has been difficult to test.”
“Our research changes that narrative and provides a new framework for exploring the role of disease in deep human history.”
The study was published today in the journal Science Advances.
_____
Margherita Colucci et al. 2026. Malaria shaped human spatial organization for the past 74 thousand years. Science Advances 12 (17); doi: 10.1126/sciadv.aea2316
