Important gaps remain in our understanding of the spread of farming into Europe, due partly to apparent contradictions between studies of contemporary genetic variation and ancient DNA. It seems clear that farming was introduced into central, northern, and eastern Europe from the south by pioneer colonization. It is often argued that these dispersals originated in the Near East, where the potential source genetic pool resembles that of the early European farmers, but clear ancient DNA evidence from Mediterranean Europe is lacking, and there are suggestions that Mediterranean Europe may have resembled the Near East more than the rest of Europe in the Mesolithic. Here, we test this proposal by dating mitogenome founder lineages from the Near East in different regions of Europe. We find that whereas the lineages date mainly to the Neolithic in central Europe and Iberia, they largely date to the Late Glacial period in central/eastern Mediterranean Europe. This supports a scenario in which the genetic pool of Mediterranean Europe was partly a result of Late Glacial expansions from a Near Eastern refuge, and that this formed an important source pool for subsequent Neolithic expansions into the rest of Europe.

• Klíčová slova
• European origins, Late Glacial, Neolithic, haplogroups, mitogenomes, phylogeography,
• MeSH
• běloši MeSH
• efekt zakladatele MeSH
• etnicita MeSH
• genetická variace * MeSH
• genom lidský * MeSH
• haplotypy MeSH
• lidé MeSH
• mitochondriální DNA analýza   MeSH
• starobylá DNA analýza   MeSH
• Check Tag
• lidé MeSH
• Publikační typ
• časopisecké články MeSH
• Geografické názvy
• Evropa MeSH
• Střední východ MeSH
• Středomoří MeSH
• Názvy látek
• mitochondriální DNA MeSH
• starobylá DNA MeSH

Scythians were nomadic and semi-nomadic people that ruled the Eurasian steppe during much of the first millennium BCE. While having been extensively studied by archaeology, very little is known about their genetic identity. To fill this gap, we analyzed ancient mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) from Scythians of the North Pontic Region (NPR) and successfully retrieved 19 whole mtDNA genomes. We have identified three potential mtDNA lineage ancestries of the NPR Scythians tracing back to hunter-gatherer and nomadic populations of east and west Eurasia as well as the Neolithic farming expansion into Europe. One third of all mt lineages in our dataset belonged to subdivisions of mt haplogroup U5. A comparison of NPR Scythian mtDNA linages with other contemporaneous Scythian groups, the Saka and the Pazyryks, reveals a common mtDNA package comprised of haplogroups H/H5, U5a, A, D/D4, and F1/F2. Of these, west Eurasian lineages show a downward cline in the west-east direction while east Eurasian haplogroups display the opposite trajectory. An overall similarity in mtDNA lineages of the NPR Scythians was found with the late Bronze Age Srubnaya population of the Northern Black Sea region which supports the archaeological hypothesis suggesting Srubnaya people as ancestors of the NPR Scythians.

• MeSH
• etnicita * MeSH
• fylogeografie MeSH
• genetická variace * MeSH
• lidé MeSH
• mitochondriální DNA chemie   genetika   MeSH
• populační genetika * MeSH
• rasové skupiny * MeSH
• sekvenční analýza DNA * MeSH
• starobylá DNA chemie   MeSH
• Check Tag
• lidé MeSH
• Publikační typ
• časopisecké články MeSH
• práce podpořená grantem MeSH
• Geografické názvy
• Asie MeSH
• Černé moře MeSH
• Evropa MeSH
• Názvy látek
• mitochondriální DNA MeSH
• starobylá DNA MeSH

Modern humans arrived in Europe ~45,000 years ago, but little is known about their genetic composition before the start of farming ~8,500 years ago. Here we analyse genome-wide data from 51 Eurasians from ~45,000-7,000 years ago. Over this time, the proportion of Neanderthal DNA decreased from 3-6% to around 2%, consistent with natural selection against Neanderthal variants in modern humans. Whereas there is no evidence of the earliest modern humans in Europe contributing to the genetic composition of present-day Europeans, all individuals between ~37,000 and ~14,000 years ago descended from a single founder population which forms part of the ancestry of present-day Europeans. An ~35,000-year-old individual from northwest Europe represents an early branch of this founder population which was then displaced across a broad region, before reappearing in southwest Europe at the height of the last Ice Age ~19,000 years ago. During the major warming period after ~14,000 years ago, a genetic component related to present-day Near Easterners became widespread in Europe. These results document how population turnover and migration have been recurring themes of European prehistory.

• MeSH
• běloši genetika   dějiny   MeSH
• biologická evoluce MeSH
• časové faktory MeSH
• dějiny starověku MeSH
• DNA analýza   genetika   izolace a purifikace   MeSH
• efekt zakladatele MeSH
• fylogeneze MeSH
• ledový příkrov * MeSH
• lidé MeSH
• migrace lidstva dějiny   MeSH
• neandertálci genetika   MeSH
• populační dynamika MeSH
• populační genetika MeSH
• sekvenční analýza DNA MeSH
• selekce (genetika) MeSH
• zvířata MeSH
• Check Tag
• dějiny starověku MeSH
• lidé MeSH
• mužské pohlaví MeSH
• ženské pohlaví MeSH
• zvířata MeSH
• Publikační typ
• časopisecké články MeSH
• historické články MeSH
• práce podpořená grantem MeSH
• Research Support, N.I.H., Extramural MeSH
• Research Support, U.S. Gov't, Non-P.H.S. MeSH
• Geografické názvy
• Evropa MeSH
• Střední východ MeSH
• Názvy látek
• DNA MeSH