A 23,000-year-old southern Iberian individual links human groups that lived in Western Europe before and after the Last Glacial Maximum

Abstract

Human populations underwent range contractions during the Last Glacial Maximum (LGM) which had lasting and dramatic effects on their genetic variation. The genetic ancestry of individuals associated with the post-LGM Magdalenian technocomplex has been interpreted as being derived from groups associated with the pre-LGM Aurignacian. However, both these ancestries differ from that of central European individuals associated with the chronologically intermediate Gravettian. Thus, the genomic transition from pre- to post-LGM remains unclear also in western Europe, where we lack genomic data associated with the intermediate Solutrean, which spans the height of the LGM. Here we present genome-wide data from sites in Andalusia in southern Spain, including from a Solutrean-associated individual from Cueva del Malalmuerzo, directly dated to ~23,000 cal yr bp. The Malalmuerzo individual carried genetic ancestry that directly connects earlier Aurignacian-associated individuals with post-LGM Magdalenian-associated ancestry in western Europe. This scenario differs from Italy, where individuals associated with the transition from pre- and post-LGM carry different genetic ancestries. This suggests different dynamics in the proposed southern refugia of Ice Age Europe and posits Iberia as a potential refugium for western European pre-LGM ancestry. More, individuals from Cueva Ardales, which were thought to be of Palaeolithic origin, date younger than expected and, together with individuals from the Andalusian sites Caserones and Aguilillas, fall within the genetic variation of the Neolithic, Chalcolithic and Bronze Age individuals from southern Iberia.

Early male and female footprints of modern humans across Eurasia and Australasia

“…Mediterranean regions 52,142,153 , coming accompanied, in addition to the aforementioned I2, by derived Y-chromosomes of the prominent Eastern Asian clade C-M130. Curiously, mtDNA haplogroups U2* and U8* lineages arrived at Europe before than its precursor U2’3’4’7’8’9.…”

Maroon rice genomic diversity reflects 350 years of colonial history

“…We grouped rice landraces that were collected in the same country and with a similar ADMIXTURE ancestry profile in a single population. As such, we followed a similar approach for population assignment as in human population genomic studies based on ancient DNA, which frequently rely on small population sizes or even single individuals as proxies for the ancestry of human groups associated with an archaeological context at a given area and moment in time (Sikora, et al 2019; Mao, et al 2021; Posth, et al 2023; Villalba-Mouco, et al 2023).…”

Tooth in the Spotlight: Exploring the Integration of Archaeological and Genetic Data to build Multidisciplinary Narratives of the Past

“…Palaeogenetics has advanced by great strides over the last three decades, including the extraction of DNA from isolated ancient fossil remains (Meyer et al 2012;Pääbo 2014;Prüfer et al 2014), the reconstitution of the genome of a fossil human population (Hajdinjak et al 2018), the identification of hybridisation phenomena between fossil populations (Fu et al 2015;Harris & Nielsen 2016;Kuhlwilm et al 2016;Sankararaman et al 2016;Hajdinjak et al 2018), and the study of the consequences of hybridisation for the epidemiology of current human populations (Silvert et al 2019;Koller et al 2022;Reilly et al 2022). Of late, achievements have concerned the extraction of DNA, including human DNA, from the sediments of caves and shelters occupied by our ancestors (Slon et al 2017;Vernot et al 2021;Massilani et al 2022), and the production of models for the Upper Palaeolithic peopling of Europe (Posth et al 2016(Posth et al , 2023Villalba-Mouco et al 2023). These developments have revealed the potential of paleogenetics to further our understanding of the evolutionary history of our lineage and the history of its adaptation to past environments.…”