TY  - JOUR
A1  - Chang, Dan
A1  - Knapp, Michael
A1  - Enk, Jacob
A1  - Lippold, Sebastian
A1  - Kircher, Martin
A1  - Lister, Adrian M.
A1  - MacPhee, Ross D. E.
A1  - Widga, Christopher
A1  - Czechowski, Paul
A1  - Sommer, Robert
A1  - Hodges, Emily
A1  - Stümpel, Nikolaus
A1  - Barnes, Ian
A1  - Dalén, Love
A1  - Derevianko, Anatoly
A1  - Germonpré, Mietje
A1  - Hillebrand-Voiculescu, Alexandra
A1  - Constantin, Silviu
A1  - Kuznetsova, Tatyana
A1  - Mol, Dick
A1  - Rathgeber, Thomas
A1  - Rosendahl, Wilfried
A1  - Tikhonov, Alexey N.
A1  - Willerslev, Eske
A1  - Hannon, Greg
A1  - Lalueza i Fox, Carles
A1  - Joger, Ulrich
A1  - Poinar, Hendrik N.
A1  - Hofreiter, Michael
A1  - Shapiro, Beth
T1  - The evolutionary and phylogeographic history of woolly mammoths
BT  - a comprehensive mitogenomic analysis
JF  - Scientific reports
N2  - Near the end of the Pleistocene epoch, populations of the woolly mammoth (Mammuthus primigenius) were distributed across parts of three continents, from western Europe and northern Asia through Beringia to the Atlantic seaboard of North America. Nonetheless, questions about the connectivity and temporal continuity of mammoth populations and species remain unanswered. We use a combination of targeted enrichment and high-throughput sequencing to assemble and interpret a data set of 143 mammoth mitochondrial genomes, sampled from fossils recovered from across their Holarctic range. Our dataset includes 54 previously unpublished mitochondrial genomes and significantly increases the coverage of the Eurasian range of the species. The resulting global phylogeny confirms that the Late Pleistocene mammoth population comprised three distinct mitochondrial lineages that began to diverge ~1.0–2.0 million years ago (Ma). We also find that mammoth mitochondrial lineages were strongly geographically partitioned throughout the Pleistocene. In combination, our genetic results and the pattern of morphological variation in time and space suggest that male-mediated gene flow, rather than large-scale dispersals, was important in the Pleistocene evolutionary history of mammoths.
Y1  - 2017
U6  - https://doi.org/10.1038/srep44585
SN  - 2045-2322
VL  - 7
PB  - Nature Publishing Group
CY  - London
ER  - 
TY  - JOUR
A1  - González-Fortes, Gloria M.
A1  - Kolbe, Ben
A1  - Fernandes, Daniel
A1  - Meleg, Ioana N.
A1  - Garcia-Vazquez, Ana
A1  - Pinto-Llona, Ana C.
A1  - Constantin, Silviu
A1  - de Torres, Trino J.
A1  - Ortiz, Jose E.
A1  - Frischauf, Christine
A1  - Rabeder, Gernot
A1  - Hofreiter, Michael
A1  - Barlow, Axel
T1  - Ancient DNA reveals differences in behaviour and sociality between brown bears and extinct cave bears
JF  - Molecular ecology
N2  - Ancient DNA studies have revolutionized the study of extinct species and populations, providing insights on phylogeny, phylogeography, admixture and demographic history. However, inferences on behaviour and sociality have been far less frequent. Here, we investigate the complete mitochondrial genomes of extinct Late Pleistocene cave bears and middle Holocene brown bears that each inhabited multiple geographically proximate caves in northern Spain. In cave bears, we find that, although most caves were occupied simultaneously, each cave almost exclusively contains a unique lineage of closely related haplotypes. This remarkable pattern suggests extreme fidelity to their birth site in cave bears, best described as homing behaviour, and that cave bears formed stable maternal social groups at least for hibernation. In contrast, brown bears do not show any strong association of mitochondrial lineage and cave, suggesting that these two closely related species differed in aspects of their behaviour and sociality. This difference is likely to have contributed to cave bear extinction, which occurred at a time in which competition for caves between bears and humans was likely intense and the ability to rapidly colonize new hibernation sites would have been crucial for the survival of a species so dependent on caves for hibernation as cave bears. Our study demonstrates the potential of ancient DNA to uncover patterns of behaviour and sociality in ancient species and populations, even those that went extinct many tens of thousands of years ago.
KW  - ancient DNA
KW  - extinction
KW  - homing
KW  - sociality
KW  - Ursus arctos
KW  - Ursus spelaeus
Y1  - 2016
U6  - https://doi.org/10.1111/mec.13800
SN  - 0962-1083
SN  - 1365-294X
VL  - 25
SP  - 4907
EP  - 4918
PB  - Wiley-Blackwell
CY  - Hoboken
ER  -