Eugene Dubois (January 28, 1858 - December 16, 1940) was a Dutch anthropologist, who earned world-wide fame with the discovery of Homo erectus in Java in 1891.

Eugene Dubois was born in the town of Eijsden in the Netherlands in 1858. The son of a pharmacist, he was fascinated by natural history from an early age. He was excellent student and graduated as a doctor in 1884. Shortly after graduating he was appointed an anatomy lecturer at Amsterdam University where he taught anatomy. But his real interest lay elsewhere, so, only a year later he gave it up to go to the Dutch East Indies ( Indonesia) in search of the remains of the missing link between human and ape.

He worked in Sumatra and Java from 1888 to 1895 for the Dutch colonial administration and discovered in a three year period starting from 1891 to 1893 remain of Homo Erectus (Java Man) near the village of Trinil, Java. The remins included skul cap, femur, and a few molars and Dubois was convinced that he had found the missing link.

On his return to Europe in 1895 and actively promoted his 'missing link theory'. This was the first evidence of human evolution, although some scientists supported him but most were scepitical. Dismayed by the poor reception, he buried the specimens he had collected under his floorboards and refused to show them to anyone and moved to other areas of research. By the time his theory gained acceptance he had already changed his mind.