The Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine 2022 was awarded to Svante Pääbo for his discoveries concerning the genomes of extinct hominins and human evolution. This paper reviews the long history of human origin and breakthrough development of biosequencing technology, combs the scientific research progress of Paabo's team, and clarifies the exploration road of ancient DNA and fruitful achievements. Pääbo and his team sequenced the entire genome of the extinct ancient human Neanderthal for the first time in the field of ancient DNA, and discovered the unknown ancient humans Denisovans. Pääbo's work provides a new evidence for the evolutionary genetics of humans. Pääbo's scientific research process of exploring gene flow in human evolution shows the serious spirit of science and the ideal ecology. Pääbo's scientific research achievements and ideas have realized the value of paleogenomics across disciplines and times and inspired us to further think about where humanity will go in the future.

Svante Pääbo  /  the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine 2022  /  ancient DNA  /  Neanderthal  /  evolutionary genetics