The oldest person in the world, a 116-year-old woman in New York whose life spanned three centuries, has died, a research group says.

Susannah Mushatt Jones, the last surviving American born in the 19th century, died Thursday night local time in a nursing home in Brooklyn, said Robert Young, director of the GRG Supercentenarian Research and Database Division, which tracks the world's oldest people.

Ms Jones was born on July 6, 1899 in the southern US state of Alabama.

She was the daughter of a cotton picker, one of 10 children born to a poor family.

In 1922, Jones went to New York and worked as a nanny before moving to California in the 1940s, Mr Young said.

She returned to Alabama before finally settling back in New York.

"She liked bacon and eggs, she liked to sleep a lot, she didn't drink and smoke, she did marry but she didn't have any kids," Mr Young said.

Ms Jones was entered into the Guinness Book of Records as the world's oldest person in July last year.

In 2005, when she celebrated her 106th birthday, she told New York's housing authority: "I surround myself with love and positive energy. That's the key to long life and happiness."

The world's oldest person is now Emma Morano of Verbania in north-west Italy, who was born November 29, 1899, Mr Young said.

She is the last known person in the world born in the 19th century and as of last year, she was still living alone in her two-room apartment.

Ms Morano credited her long life to being independent, having left an abusive husband in 1938 and remaining single ever since, the New York Times reported last year.

She also cited a habit of eating two raw eggs and a cooked egg every day.

The world's longest-living person on record was Jeanne Calment of France, who died at 122 years and 164 days in 1997.

AFP