Late Pleistocene human genome suggests a local origin for the first farmers of central Anatolia.

Feldman, Michal; Fernández-Domínguez, Eva; Reynolds, Luke; Baird, Douglas; Pearson, Jessica; Hershkovitz, Israel; May, Hila; Goring-Morris, Nigel et al. · Nat Commun · 2019

Where this comes from

Abstract

Anatolia was home to some of the earliest farming communities. It has been long debated whether a migration of farming groups introduced agriculture to central Anatolia. Here, we report the first genome-wide data from a 15,000-year-old Anatolian hunter-gatherer and from seven Anatolian and Levantine early farmers. We find high genetic continuity (~80-90%) between the hunter-gatherers and early farmers of Anatolia and detect two distinct incoming ancestries: an early Iranian/Caucasus related one and a later one linked to the ancient Levant. Finally, we observe a genetic link between southern Europe and the Near East predating 15,000 years ago. Our results suggest a limited role of human migration in the emergence of agriculture in central Anatolia.

Medical subject headings