Carbon Record Reveals Evidence of Extensive Human Fire Use 50,000 Years Ago

'It has long been unclear when humans started using fire,' writes Phys.org...

To address this question, researchers from the Institute of Oceanology of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (IOCAS), alongside collaborators from China, Germany, and France, analyzed the pyrogenic carbon record in a 300,000-year-old sediment core from the East China Sea. 'Our findings challenge the widely held belief that humans only began influencing the environment with fire in the recent past, during the Holocene,' said Dr. Zhao Debo, the study's corresponding author.
This study, published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, highlights the presence of charred plant remains — known as pyrogenic carbon — formed when vegetation burns but is not completely consumed by fire. The research reveals a notable increase in fire activity across East Asia approximately 50,000 years ago. This finding aligns with earlier reports of heightened fire activities in Europe, Southeast Asia, and the Papua New Guinea-Australia region respectively, suggesting a continental-scale intensification of fire use during this period... The study highlights that this global rise in fire use coincides with the rapid spread of Homo sapiens, increasing population densities, and a greater reliance on fire, particularly amid cold, glacial conditions...

These conclusions have significant implications for understanding Earth's sensitivity to human impacts. If human fire management altered atmospheric carbon levels tens of thousands of years ago, current climate models may underestimate the historical baseline of human-environment interactions.

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