Neanderthals and humans co-existed in Europe for around 2,000 years, study finds

Neanderthals and humans lived alongside each other in France and northern Spain for up to 2,900 years, modeling research suggested Thursday, giving them plenty of time to potentially learn from or even breed with each other.

While the study, published in the journal Scientific Reports, did not provide evidence that humans directly interacted with Neanderthals around 42,000 years ago, previous genetic research has shown that they must have at some point.

Research by Swedish paleogeneticist Svante Paabo, who won the Nobel Prize in Medicine last week, helped reveal that people of European descent— and almost everyone worldwide — have a small percentage of Neanderthal DNA.