A new paper involving Environment Institute members Clio Der Sarkissian, Alan Cooper and Wolfgang Haak as well as Oleg Balanovsky(Russian Academy of Medical Sciences & Russian Academy of Sciences), Valery Zaporozhchenko (Russian Academy of Medical Sciences), Elena Balanovska (Russian Academy of Medical Sciences),Guido Brandt (Johannes Gutenberg University of Mainz), Kurt W. Alt (Johannes Gutenberg University of Mainz),Valery Khartanovich(Kunstkamera Museum), Vyacheslav Moiseyev (Kunstkamera Museum),Alexandra Buzhilova (Russian Academy of Sciences), Sergey Koshel (Moscow State University),Römisch-Germanisches (Zentralmuseum), Eugen Kolpakov(Russian Academy of Science), Vladimir Shumkin(Russian Academy of Science) has recently been published in the journal PLoS Genetics.

The paper titled ‘Ancient DNA Reveals Prehistoric Gene-Flow from Siberia in the Complex Human Population History of North East Europe‘ analysed the mitochondrial DNA of prehistoric remains from archaeological sites in North East Europe dated to 7,500 and 3,500 years Before Present.

Wolfgang Haak, one of the contributing authors on the paper

This region in Europe displays a significant cultural and linguistic diversity today, however no ancient human DNA was available before. The resutls show that prehistoric hunter-gatherers of North East Europe were genetically similar to other European foragers. The authors also detected a prehistoric genetic input from Siberia, followed by migrations from Western Europe into North East Europe.

This research contributes to the understanding of the origins and past dynamics of human population in Europe.

Download the paper to find out more.