TY - JOUR T1 - Genomics of Mesolithic Scandinavia reveal colonization routes and high-latitude adaptation JF - bioRxiv DO - 10.1101/164400 SP - 164400 AU - Torsten Günther AU - Helena Malmström AU - Emma M. Svensson AU - Ayça Omrak AU - Federico Sánchez-Quinto AU - Gülşah M. Kılınç AU - Maja Krzewińska AU - Gunilla Eriksson AU - Magdalena Fraser AU - Hanna Edlund AU - Arielle R. Munters AU - Alexandra Coutinho AU - Luciana G. Simões AU - Mário Vicente AU - Anders Sjölander AU - Berit Jansen Sellevold AU - Roger Jørgensen AU - Peter Claes AU - Mark D. Shriver AU - Cristina Valdiosera AU - Mihai G. Netea AU - Jan Apel AU - Kerstin Lidén AU - Birgitte Skar AU - Jan Storå AU - Anders Götherström AU - Mattias Jakobsson Y1 - 2017/01/01 UR - http://biorxiv.org/content/early/2017/07/17/164400.abstract N2 - Scandinavia was one of the last geographic areas in Europe to become habitable for humans after the last glaciation. However, the origin(s) of the first colonizers and their migration routes remain unclear. We sequenced the genomes, up to 57x coverage, of seven hunter-gatherers excavated across Scandinavia and dated to 9,500-6,000 years before present. Surprisingly, among the Scandinavian Mesolithic individuals, the genetic data display an east-west genetic gradient that opposes the pattern seen in other parts of Mesolithic Europe. This result suggests that Scandinavia was initially colonized following two different routes: one from the south, the other from the northeast. The latter followed the ice-free Norwegian north Atlantic coast, along which novel and advanced pressure-blade stone-tool techniques may have spread. These two groups met and mixed in Scandinavia, creating a genetically diverse population, which shows patterns of genetic adaptation to high latitude environments. These adaptations include high frequencies of low pigmentation variants and a gene-region associated with physical performance, which shows strong continuity into modern-day northern Europeans. Finally, we were able to compute a 3D facial reconstruction of a Mesolithic woman from her high-coverage genome, giving a glimpse into an individual’s physical appearance in the Mesolithic. ER -