The fundamental shift associated with the domestication of plants and animals allowed for a dramatic increase in human population sizes and the emergence of modern society. Despite its importance and ...the decades of research devoted to studying it, questions regarding the origins and processes of domestication remain. Here, we review recent theoretical advances and present a perspective that underscores the crucial role that population admixture has played in influencing the genomes of domestic animals over the past 10 000 years. We then discuss novel approaches to generating and analysing genetic data, emphasising the importance of an explicit hypothesis-testing approach for the inference of the origins and subsequent evolution and demography of domestic animals. By applying next-generation sequencing technology alongside appropriate biostatistical methodologies, a substantially deeper understanding of domestication is on the horizon.
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GEOZS, IJS, IMTLJ, KILJ, KISLJ, NUK, OILJ, PNG, SAZU, SBCE, SBJE, UL, UM, UPCLJ, UPUK
2.
The Evolution of Animal Domestication Larson, Greger; Fuller, Dorian Q
Annual review of ecology, evolution, and systematics,
11/2014, Volume:
45, Issue:
1
Journal Article
Peer reviewed
The domestication of plants and animals over the past 11,500 years has had a significant effect not just on the domesticated taxa but also on human evolution and on the biosphere as a whole. Decades ...of research into the geographical and chronological origins of domestic animals have led to a general understanding of the pattern and process of domestication, though a number of significant questions remain unresolved. Here, building upon recent theoretical advances regarding the different pathways animals followed to become domesticated, we present a large-scale synthesis that addresses the global pattern of animal domestication alongside a discussion of the differential evolutionary processes that have shaped domestic animal populations. More specifically, we present a framework for understanding how unconscious selection characterized the earliest steps of animal domestication and the role of introgression and the importance of relaxed and positive selection in shaping modern domestic phenotypes and genomes.
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BFBNIB, INZLJ, NMLJ, NUK, PNG, SAZU, UL, UM, UPUK, ZRSKP
The domestication of animals led to a major shift in human subsistence patterns, from a hunter-gatherer to a sedentary agricultural lifestyle, which ultimately resulted in the development of complex ...societies. Over the past 15,000 years, the phenotype and genotype of multiple animal species, such as dogs, pigs, sheep, goats, cattle and horses, have been substantially altered during their adaptation to the human niche. Recent methodological innovations, such as improved ancient DNA extraction methods and next-generation sequencing, have enabled the sequencing of whole ancient genomes. These genomes have helped reconstruct the process by which animals entered into domestic relationships with humans and were subjected to novel selection pressures. Here, we discuss and update key concepts in animal domestication in light of recent contributions from ancient genomics.
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FZAB, GEOZS, IJS, IMTLJ, KILJ, KISLJ, MFDPS, NLZOH, NUK, OILJ, PNG, SAZU, SBCE, SBJE, SBMB, SBNM, UKNU, UL, UM, UPUK, VKSCE, ZAGLJ
Ecological consequences of human niche construction Boivin, Nicole L.; Zeder, Melinda A.; Fuller, Dorian Q. ...
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences - PNAS,
06/2016, Volume:
113, Issue:
23
Journal Article
Peer reviewed
Open access
The exhibition of increasingly intensive and complex niche construction behaviors through time is a key feature of human evolution, culminating in the advanced capacity for ecosystem engineering ...exhibited by Homo sapiens. A crucial outcome of such behaviors has been the dramatic reshaping of the global biosphere, a transformation whose early origins are increasingly apparent from cumulative archaeological and paleoecological datasets. Such data suggest that, by the Late Pleistocene, humans had begun to engage in activities that have led to alterations in the distributions of a vast array of species across most, if not all, taxonomic groups. Changes to biodiversity have included extinctions, extirpations, and shifts in species composition, diversity, and community structure. We outline key examples of these changes, highlighting findings from the study of new datasets, like ancient DNA (aDNA), stable isotopes, and microfossils, as well as the application of new statistical and computational methods to datasets that have accumulated significantly in recent decades. We focus on four major phases that witnessed broad anthropogenic alterations to biodiversity—the Late Pleistocene global human expansion, the Neolithic spread of agriculture, the era of island colonization, and the emergence of early urbanized societies and commercial networks. Archaeological evidence documents millennia of anthropogenic transformations that have created novel ecosystems around the world. This record has implications for ecological and evolutionary research, conservation strategies, and the maintenance of ecosystem services, pointing to a significant need for broader cross-disciplinary engagement between archaeology and the biological and environmental sciences.
The Russian Farm-Fox Experiment is the best known experimental study in animal domestication. By subjecting a population of foxes to selection for tameness alone, Dimitry Belyaev generated foxes that ...possessed a suite of characteristics that mimicked those found across domesticated species. This ‘domestication syndrome’ has been a central focus of research into the biological pathways modified during domestication. Here, we chart the origins of Belyaev’s foxes in eastern Canada and critically assess the appearance of domestication syndrome traits across animal domesticates. Our results suggest that both the conclusions of the Farm-Fox Experiment and the ubiquity of domestication syndrome have been overstated. To understand the process of domestication requires a more comprehensive approach focused on essential adaptations to human-modified environments.
The ‘domestication syndrome’ has been a central focus of research into the biological processes underlying domestication. The Russian Farm-Fox Experiment was the first to test whether there is a causal relationship between selection for tameness and the domestication syndrome.Historical records and genetic analysis show that the foxes used in the Farm-Fox Experiment originated from fur farms in eastern Canada and that most traits attributed to the behavioral selection for tameness predated the experiment, undermining a central pillar of support for the domestication syndrome.The overall weight of evidence, including data from other species, does not unambiguously support the existence of the domestication syndrome in animals. Competing theories to explain domestication syndrome should be reconsidered after the traits themselves are more clearly connected to the early stages of domestication.
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GEOZS, IJS, IMTLJ, KILJ, KISLJ, NLZOH, NUK, OILJ, PNG, SAZU, SBCE, SBJE, UILJ, UL, UM, UPCLJ, UPUK, ZAGLJ, ZRSKP
The myriad downstream applications of ancient DNA (aDNA) analysis all ultimately require that sequence data are generated from extracts of ancient material. DNA extraction from tissues known to ...contain preserved biomolecules (e.g. teeth, hair, tissue, bone) relies on subtle modifications of a basic technique that has been in use for nearly two decades. Multiple DNA extraction protocols have been introduced, with varying levels of success depending on tissue type and the long-term preservation environment to which the ancient tissue was exposed. Here, we describe the phenol–chloroform method for extracting aDNA from any tissue type. This commonly employed method allows for the recovery of total nucleic acid content with minimal loss of low molecular weight double-stranded DNA.
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FIS, FZAB, GEOZS, GIS, IJS, IMTLJ, KILJ, KISLJ, MFDPS, NUK, OBVAL, OILJ, PNG, SAZU, SBCE, SBJE, SBMB, SBNM, UKNU, UL, UM, UPUK, VKSCE, ZAGLJ
Nearly three decades ago, zooarchaeologists postulated that chicken husbandry was practiced in Northern China by ∼8.0 ka calBP. Recently, ancient mitogenome analyses of galliform remains suggested ...that Red jungle fowl (Gallus gallus) was already present in the Yellow River basin several millennia earlier, shortly after the onset of the Holocene. If these conclusions are correct, the origins of chicken domestication and husbandry in the region may have been spurred by agricultural innovations in the lower Yellow River basin including millet cultivation, pig husbandry, and dog breeding. In addition, the dispersal of poultry farming from East Asia to Asia Minor and Europe could therefore date to the Neolithic along ancient trade routes across Central Asia rather than via South Asia and Mesopotamia. For this scenario to be plausible, the post-Pleistocene climatic conditions must have been favourable to allow for a northward extension of the native distribution of tropical Red jungle fowl currently not found north of ∼25°N. This study combines Holocene palaeoclimate and archaeofaunal archives with new zooarchaeological insights alongside a discussion of methodological issues and cultural aspects in order to revisit the hypothesis of an early Holocene Gallus domestication and Neolithic poultry husbandry in Northern China. Our results regarding the natural and cultural history of Red jungle fowl and domestic chickens in East Asia, and the timing of chicken dispersal across the Old World suggest that an early Holocene domestication of chickens is problematic at best. We conclude by postulating an alternative model for the early exploitation of a key domestic species in present-day East Asia.
•This study revisits the long-standing hypothesis of chicken domestication in Holocene Northern China.•Mammalian composition in Northern Chinese Neolithic sites is essentially Palaearctic.•Zooarchaeology points to the absence of Gallus in Northern China prior to ∼3.5 ka calBP.•The Shang Dynasty (∼1600-1046 BCE) likely marks the onset of poultry farming in Northern China.
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GEOZS, IJS, IMTLJ, KILJ, KISLJ, NUK, OILJ, PNG, SAZU, SBCE, SBJE, UL, UM, UPCLJ, UPUK, ZRSKP
Larson talks about a study by Wang and colleagues which systematically searched for evidence for the presence of wolves in China. Result from the study demonstrates the pitfalls of taking species ...distribution maps at face value as the line demarking the southern boundary of the grey wolf distribution has enormous ramifications. If wolves were present in central and southern China as recently as the second half of the 20th century, they were likely present in the preceding millennia and thus, they could have been the source of a domestication process in East Asia.
SignificanceChickens are the world's most numerous domestic animal. In order to understand when, where, and how they first became associated with human societies, we critically assessed the domestic ...status of chicken remains described in >600 sites in 89 countries, and evaluated zoogeographic, morphological, osteometric, stratigraphic, contextual, iconographic, and textual data. Although previous studies have made claims for an early origin of chickens, our results suggest that unambiguous chickens were not present until ∼1650 to 1250 BCE in central Thailand. A correlation between early chickens and the first appearance of rice and millet cultivation suggests that the production and storage of these cereals may have acted as a magnet, thus initiating the chicken domestication process.
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