%0 Thesis
%A Posth, Cosimo
%+ Archaeogenetics, Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History, Max Planck Society
%T Paleogenetic investigations of hominin diversity and dispersals in Eurasian prehistory : 
%G eng
%U https://hdl.handle.net/21.11116/0000-0007-1BAA-C
%D 2017
%P 306
%V phd
%9 phd
%X Ancient DNA (aDNA) is able to provide genetic snapshots into the human past<br>that can be linked together to study evolutionary processes and demographic<br>patterns impossible to uncover with the study of modern-day DNA alone. In this<br>thesis I make use of major methodological “game changers” in the field of aDNA<br>in order to reconstruct complete mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA), as well as<br>genome-wide nuclear data (nDNA) from ancient human specimens. The<br>combination of next generation sequencing (NGS) technologies and target<br>enrichment paired up with sampling of different anatomical elements, enabled me<br>to expand the amount of analyzable hominin remains ranging from Pleistocene<br>European hunter-gatherers to Holocene farmers in Remote Oceania. I first<br>investigated the mtDNA of late Neandertals from Goyet cave in Belgium and of<br>an archaic femur from Hohlenstein-Stadel in southwest Germany to explore the<br>changes in genetic diversity of this extinct hominins through time and provide the<br>temporal interval for a putative African gene flow event into Neandertal<br>populations. In addition, I carried out two studies that explored demographic<br>changes in European Upper Paleolithic and Mesolithic hunter-gatherers by<br>means of both mtDNA and nDNA, and revealed population structure and<br>unexpected genetic turnovers in Ice Age Europe. By expanding the temporal and<br>geographical distribution of genomic data it was able to infer population<br>movements in European prehistory and compare them to climatic and<br>archaeological records over almost 40,000 years. While the formation of some<br>genetic clusters tightly matches to the associated archaeological changes across<br>Europe, other major genomic transformations seem to be more influenced by<br>environmental fluctuations. In the last project, I contributed in producing aDNA of<br>four individuals among the first settlers of Vanuatu and Tonga in the Southwest<br>Pacific. Sampling the petrous portion of their temporal bones allowed me to<br>retrieve genomic data from climatic conditions unfavorable for DNA preservation.<br>Those genomes highlight the role of previously unknown dispersals in shaping<br>the ancestry of present-day people in Remote Oceania. Here, I take a time trip to<br>shed light into the genetic history of our ancestors and closest extinct relatives.
%K Vor- und Frühgeschichte , DNS