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‘Truly gobsmacked’: Ancient-human genome count surpasses 10,000

The majority of sequences come from people who lived in Western Eurasia, but samples from other regions are on the rise.
  1. Ewen Callaway
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In 2010, researchers published the first genome sequence from an ancient human, using tufts of hair from a man who lived around 4,000 years ago in Greenland1. In the 13 years since, scientists have generated genome data from more than 10,000 ancient people — and there’s no sign of a slowdown.

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Nature 617, 20 (2023)

doi: https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-023-01403-4

References

  1. Rasmussen, M. et al. Nature 463, 757–762 (2010).

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  2. Mallick, S. et al. Preprint via bioRxiv at https://doi.org/10.1101/2023.04.06.535797 (2023).

  3. Brielle, E. S. et al. Nature 615, 866–873 (2023).

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