DNA sheds light on Neanderthal mixing

A genome taken from a 36,000-year-old skeleton has helped scientists shed new light on interbreeding between humans and Neanderthals.

The ground-breaking study of DNA recovered from a fossil of one of the earliest known Europeans - a man who lived in western Russia - shows that the genetics of the earliest inhabitants of the continent survived the last ice age, helping form the basis of the modern-day population.

Known as the Kostenki genome, the DNA also contained evidence the man shared, as with all people of Eurasia today, a small percentage of Neanderthal genes, confirming previous findings which show a period when Neanderthals and the first humans to leave Africa for Europe briefly interbred.

This means that, even today, anyone with a Eurasian ancestry - from Chinese to Scandinavian and North American - has a small element of Neanderthal DNA.

But despite Western Eurasians going on to share the European landmass with Neanderthals for another 10,000 years, no further periods of interbreeding occurred, the study said.

Robert Foley, a University of Cambridge professor, questioned whether Neanderthal populations were quickly dwindling and whether modern humans still encountered them.

"We were originally surprised to discover there had been interbreeding," Foley said.

"Now the question is, why so little?

"It's an extraordinary finding that we don't understand yet."

Lead author Eske Willerslev said the work revealed the complex web of population relationships in the past, generating for the first time a firm framework with which to explore how humans responded to climate change, encounters with other populations, and the dynamic landscapes of the ice age.

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DNA sheds light on Neanderthal mixing