CALGARY Our ancestor Homo erectus was able to survive punishingly hot and dry desert more than a million years ago, according to a new study that casts doubt on the idea that Homo sapiens were the first humans capable of living in such hostile terrain. The moment when the first members of the extended human family called hominins adapted to life in desert or tropical forests marks "a turning point in the history of human survival and expansion in extreme environments," lead study author Julio