David Frayer, a professor of anthropology at the University of Kansas holds a replica cast of the skull of an Australian Aborigine. Frayer is part of an international team of researchers who have published a report disputing claims that bones found on the Indonesian island of Flores were those of a previously unknown hobbit species.

Small bones found on the Indonesian island of Flores are not those of a separate “hobbit” species, but relatives of the modern human pygmies, according to the research of a Kansas University professor and others published in the current issue of The Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

“There’s going to be a firestorm,” KU anthropology professor David Frayer said. “It’s already begun.”

Scientists in 2004 announced the discovery of the 18,000-year-old remains in an Indonesian cave. The finding was believed to be the remains of a new species.

But the latest report casts doubt on that conclusion.

The new report indicates the remains do not represent a new species, but a relative of modern human pygmies with microcephaly, a condition in which the head and brain are smaller than average.

Frayer worked with an international team of scientists.

He studied the specimen’s face and found numerous points of asymmetry – indication of an abnormal developmental disorder.

The team also concluded that earlier work on the skeleton compared it to humans from other areas of the world, mainly Europe. But, the researchers found, the skeleton shared some features that are not uncommon to the Australomelanesian region.

The research explored other areas that also led to the conclusion that the remains are not those of a new species.