Some recent studies suggest that all humans outside of Africa have inherited some genes from Neanderthals, and that Melanesians are the only known modern humans whose prehistoric ancestors interbred with the Denisova hominin, sharing 4%–6% of their genome with this ancient cousin of the Neanderthal.[7] Blond hair is exceptionally rare outside Europe, but evolved independently in Melanesia[8]where Melanesians of some islands (along with some Australian aborigines) are one of the few non-European peoples to have blond hair. This has been traced to an allele of TYRP1 unique to these people, and is not the same gene that causes blond hair in Europe. Predominantly Melanesian areas include parts of the Moluccas of Eastern Indonesia, the New Guinea and surrounding islands, the Solomon Islands, Vanuatu and Fiji. The region New Caledonia and nearby Loyalty Islands for most of its history has had a majority Melanesian population, but its proportion has dropped to slightly below half in the face of immigration over the last century to present time. The largest and most populous Melanesian country is Papua New Guinea. The largest city in Melanesia is Port Moresby in Papua New Guinea with about 300,000 people, mostly of Melanesian ancestry.
