Only 70 people lived in N. America

Experts say no more than 70 people lived in North America during the initial settlement of the continent between 12,000 and 14,000 years ago.

The new DNA study by Professor Jody Hey of Rutgers University explored nine genomic regions to account for variations in single genes, assuming that sizes of founding populations changed over time.

“The estimated effective size of the founding population for the New World is about 70 individuals,” Live Science quoted Hey as saying.

He said that his method favored “actual genetic data over estimates used in previous calculations,” adding that his study focused on the genetics of people who spoke Amerind -- one of the three main language groups in North America used by the earliest migrants who resided in the Americas.

“The beauty of the new methodology is that it uses actual DNA sequences collected from Asian peoples and Native Americans, an approach that can provide a detailed portrait of historical populations.”

Earlier in March, a team of archaeologists near Austin, Texas, found 15,528 artifacts and stone tools, which also rejected all previous theories about native settlement.

Lead archaeologist Michael Waters of Texas A&M University said the discovery was “like finding the Holy Grail.”

“This is almost like a baseball bat to the side of the head of the archaeological community,” he added.

The long-held theory among archaeologists is that the first people who colonized America were called the Clovis, a prehistoric race who first appeared in North America at the end of the last glacial period 13,000 to 13,500 years ago.

Also referred to as the Llanos, they are named after their distinctive “Clovis point” hunting tools in the 1930s at Clovis, New Mexico.

There are many theories concerning their disappearance, but the most popular belief is that the Clovis culture adapted across America and finally merged into other cultures.