Evolutionäre Analysen von Schweine-Paläogenomen zum Verständnis von Ursprung und Domestikation des Hausschweins
Allgemeine Genetik und funktionelle Genomforschung
Zusammenfassung der Projektergebnisse
This project successfully obtained both full mitochondrial genomes and nuclear genomic data from 26 and 12 ancient pig fossil from China. These samples date from the beginning of pig domestication to around 2,000 years BP and allow a substantially improved understanding of the domestication process of wild boar and their change to modern domesticated pigs both in China and worldwide. Furthermore, during the project, low coverage nuclear genomes could also be obtained from an ancient sheep and an ancient cattle specimen from China. The key findings are: Through analysis of a total of 26 ancient mitogenomes, we could show that the female lineages throughout the first 8,000 years of pig domestication in China align closely with the modern lineages known from this region from both wild boar and domesticated pigs, revealing 10,000 years of local female continuity in Chinese pigs. - The mitogenome data also suggest that wild boar from China’s southwest contributed little, if anything to the domesticated gene pool. - We also show, using this data set that ancient Chinese pigs from a number of geographical regions and points in time were relatively closely related, suggesting female gene flow across both space and time. - Finally, the mitochondrial data show a substantial increase in the pig populatin size around 3,000 years ago, a result that still needs to be put into the context of Chinese history and potential cultural and agricultural changes. - Our nuclear results show strong clustering of pigs according to their geographical origin, not only regarding Europe vs. China but also for different regions within China. - The nuclear data of our 12 archaeological samples generally fall at the base of pig diversity from separate regions within China or even at the base of all Chinese pigs. Thus, our data recover the early stages of pig domestication in China. - Last, we obtained one > 2x genome for an ancient cattle specimen as well as an ancient sheep specimen, providing the data base for further analyses of the domestication history of these two species in China.
