Iron age genomic data from Althiburos-Tunisia renew the debate on the origins of African taurine cattle

The Maghreb is a key region for understanding the dynamics of cattle dispersal and admixture with local aurochs following their earliest domestication in the Fertile Crescent more than 10,000 years ago. Here, we present data on autosomal genomes and mitogenomes obtained for four archaeological speci...

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Detalles Bibliográficos
Autores: Ginja, Catarina, Guimarães, Silvia, Fonseca, Rute. R. da, Rasteiro, Rita, Rodríguez-Varela, Ricardo, Simões, Luciana G., Sarmento, Cindy, Belarte, Maria Carme, Kallala, Nabil, Torres, Joan Ramon, Sanmartí, Joan, Arruda, Ana Margarida, Detry, Cleia, Davis, Simon, Matos, José, Götherström, Anders, Pires, Ana Elisabete, Valenzuela-Lamas, Silvia
Tipo de recurso: artículo
Estado:Versión publicada
Fecha de publicación:2023
País:España
Institución:Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas (CSIC)
Repositorio:DIGITAL.CSIC. Repositorio Institucional del CSIC
OAI Identifier:oai:digital.csic.es:10261/343877
Acceso en línea:http://hdl.handle.net/10261/343877
Access Level:acceso abierto
Palabra clave:Biological sciences
Omics
Genomics
Paleobiology
Paleogenetics
Descripción
Sumario:The Maghreb is a key region for understanding the dynamics of cattle dispersal and admixture with local aurochs following their earliest domestication in the Fertile Crescent more than 10,000 years ago. Here, we present data on autosomal genomes and mitogenomes obtained for four archaeological specimens of Iron Age (∼2,800 cal BP–2,000 cal BP) domestic cattle from the Eastern Maghreb, i.e. Althiburos (El Kef, Tunisia). D-loop sequences were obtained for an additional eight cattle specimens from this site. Maternal lineages were assigned to the elusive R and ubiquitous African-T1 haplogroups found in two and ten Althiburos specimens, respectively. Our results can be explained by post-domestication hybridization of Althiburos cattle with local aurochs. However, we cannot rule out an independent domestication in North Africa considering the shared ancestry of Althiburos cattle with the pre-domestic Moroccan aurochs and present-day African taurine cattle.