Abstract
One of the main findings derived from the analysis of the Neandertal genome was the evidence for admixture between Neandertals and non-African modern humans. An alternative scenario is that the ancestral population of non-Africans was closer to Neandertals than to Africans because of ancient population substructure. Thus, the study of North African populations is crucial for testing both hypotheses. We analyzed a total of 780,000 SNPs in 125 individuals representing seven different North African locations and searched for their ancestral/derived state in comparison to different human populations and Neandertals. We found that North African populations have a significant excess of derived alleles shared with Neandertals, when compared to sub-Saharan Africans. This excess is similar to that found in non-African humans, a fact that can be interpreted as a sign of Neandertal admixture. Furthermore, the Neandertal's genetic signal is higher in populations with a local, pre-Neolithic North African ancestry. Therefore, the detected ancient admixture is not due to recent Near Eastern or European migrations. Sub-Saharan populations are the only ones not affected by the admixture event with Neandertals.
Highlights
The most striking finding derived from the Neandertal genome project [1] was the evidence for admixture between Neandertals and a population of modern humans that left Africa between 80 Kya and 50 Kya subsequently expanding into the rest of the world
The study involved the sequencing and comparison of the Neandertal genome to five modern human genomes: two African (Yoruba and San) and three non-Africans (French, Chinese and Melanesian); all the non-African human genomes shared with Neandertals between 1–4% of their genome, in regions of low recombination placed along ten chromosomes [1]
We show that North African populations, like all non-African humans [1], carry the signature of admixture with Neandertals, and that the real geographical limit for Neandertal admixture is between sub-Saharan groups and the rest
Summary
The most striking finding derived from the Neandertal genome project [1] was the evidence for admixture between Neandertals and a population of modern humans that left Africa between 80 Kya and 50 Kya subsequently expanding into the rest of the world. Additional genomic region introgressions from Neandertals, Denisovans and putative archaic African hominins have been recently described in Eurasian, Oceanic and even African populations, respectively [2,3,4,5,6,7]. Recent dating of the characteristic North African lithic industry, called Aterian, has provided much older dates than previously assumed, ranging from 145 Kya to 40 Kya [12],[13]. These Aterian people made personal ornaments with shells, a sign of modern human symbolic behavior [14]. Morphometric analyses of the 80 Kya Dar es-Soltan skull (Morocco) and of Aterian hominin teeth show similarities with early modern humans from Qafzeh and Skhul (Israel) and with the later skull of Pestera cu Oase (Romania) [15],[16]
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