A new study doubles the age of ancient DNA in sub-Saharan Africa, revealing how people moved, mingled and had children together over the last 50,000 years.
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Articles on aDNA
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By studying the DNA of people who lived in East Asia thousands of years ago, scientists are starting to untangle how the region was populated.
Archaeologists have long argued over when and how people first domesticated horses. A decade ago, new techniques appeared to have provided answers – but further discoveries change the story again.
20 years ago, who could predict how much more researchers would know today about the human past – let alone what they could learn from a thimble of dirt, a scrape of dental plaque, or satellites in space.
People caught and died from plague long before it caused major epidemics like the Black Death in the middle ages. Could what scientists call cultural resistance be what kept the disease under control?
Pastoralism is a central part of many Africans’ identity. But how and when did this way of life get started on the continent? Ancient DNA can reveal how herding populations spread.
Ancient DNA allows scientists to learn directly from the remains of people from the past. As this new field takes off, researchers are figuring out how to ethically work with ancient samples and each other.
Modern techniques such as CT scanning and ancient DNA analysis have allowed scientists to discover a great deal about a mummy found in a shallow grave in Botswana.
Top contributors
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Assistant Curator of Human Evolution., University of Alberta
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Associate Professor of Anthropology, Rice University
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Professor; Head of the School of Anatomical Sciences, University of the Witwatersrand
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Director of the Institute of Evolutionary Medicine, University of Zurich
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Lecturer, California State University, Long Beach
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MPhil Candidate in Bioscience Enterprise, University of Cambridge
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Assistant Professor and Curator of Archaeology, University of Colorado Boulder
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Assistant Professor of Biology, University of Richmond
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Assistant Professor of Anthropology, Yale University
