The peopling of the hinterland of the Tibetan Plateau during the late MIS 3

Reaching the Tibetan Plateau is notoriously challenging due to its high elevations and the surrounding mountain ranges.Consid-ering environmental pressures such as low temperatures and pre-cipitations,patchy resources,and especially hypoxia,continued survival in the region requires both biological and behavioral adap-tations.This is probably why for a long time the Plateau was con-sidered among the last regions occupied by human beings.Coping with such a harsh environment was once viewed as a behavior unique to Homo sapiens(modern humans)[1].New discoveries have challenged these ideas,suggesting archaic hominins such as Denisovans arrived as early as the Marine Isotope Stage 6(MIS 6)[2].In terms of the hinterland,the site of Nwya Devu(ND)offers evidence for human activities extended back to late MIS 3[3].