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Climate and mountains shaped human ancestral genetic lineages

View ORCID ProfilePierpaolo Maisano Delser, Mario Krapp, Robert Beyer, Eppie R Jones, Eleanor F Miller, Anahit Hovhannisyan, Michelle Parker, Veronika Siska, Maria Teresa Vizzari, Elizabeth J. Pearmain, Ivan Imaz-Rosshandler, View ORCID ProfileMichela Leonardi, Gian Luigi Somma, Jason Hodgson, Eirlys Tysall, Zhe Xue, Lara Cassidy, Daniel G Bradley, Anders Eriksson, Andrea Manica
doi: https://doi.org/10.1101/2021.07.13.452067
Pierpaolo Maisano Delser
1Department of Zoology, University of Cambridge, Cambridge CB2 3EJ, UK
2Smurfit Institute of Genetics, Trinity College Dublin, Dublin 2, Ireland
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  • ORCID record for Pierpaolo Maisano Delser
  • For correspondence: pm604@cam.ac.uk am315@cam.ac.uk
Mario Krapp
1Department of Zoology, University of Cambridge, Cambridge CB2 3EJ, UK
3GNS Science, 30 Gracefield Rd, Gracefield, Lower Hutt 5010, New Zealand
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Robert Beyer
1Department of Zoology, University of Cambridge, Cambridge CB2 3EJ, UK
4Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research (PIK), Member of the Leibniz Association, Telegrafenberg A 31, 14473 Potsdam, Germany
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Eppie R Jones
1Department of Zoology, University of Cambridge, Cambridge CB2 3EJ, UK
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Eleanor F Miller
1Department of Zoology, University of Cambridge, Cambridge CB2 3EJ, UK
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Anahit Hovhannisyan
5Institute of Molecular Biology, National Academy of Sciences, 7 Hasratyan Street, 0014 Yerevan, Armenia
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Michelle Parker
1Department of Zoology, University of Cambridge, Cambridge CB2 3EJ, UK
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Veronika Siska
1Department of Zoology, University of Cambridge, Cambridge CB2 3EJ, UK
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Maria Teresa Vizzari
6Department of Life Sciences and Biotechnology, University of Ferrara, 44121 Ferrara, Italy
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Elizabeth J. Pearmain
1Department of Zoology, University of Cambridge, Cambridge CB2 3EJ, UK
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Ivan Imaz-Rosshandler
1Department of Zoology, University of Cambridge, Cambridge CB2 3EJ, UK
7MRC Laboratory of Molecular Biology, Cambridge Biomedical Campus, Francis Crick Avenue, Cambridge CB2 0QH, UK
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Michela Leonardi
1Department of Zoology, University of Cambridge, Cambridge CB2 3EJ, UK
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Gian Luigi Somma
1Department of Zoology, University of Cambridge, Cambridge CB2 3EJ, UK
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Jason Hodgson
1Department of Zoology, University of Cambridge, Cambridge CB2 3EJ, UK
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Eirlys Tysall
1Department of Zoology, University of Cambridge, Cambridge CB2 3EJ, UK
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Zhe Xue
1Department of Zoology, University of Cambridge, Cambridge CB2 3EJ, UK
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Lara Cassidy
2Smurfit Institute of Genetics, Trinity College Dublin, Dublin 2, Ireland
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Daniel G Bradley
2Smurfit Institute of Genetics, Trinity College Dublin, Dublin 2, Ireland
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Anders Eriksson
8cGEM, Institute of Genomics, University of Tartu, Riia 23b, 51010 Tartu, Estonia
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Andrea Manica
1Department of Zoology, University of Cambridge, Cambridge CB2 3EJ, UK
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  • For correspondence: pm604@cam.ac.uk am315@cam.ac.uk
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Abstract

Extensive sequencing of modern and ancient human genomes has revealed that contemporary populations can be explained as the result of recent mixing of a few distinct ancestral genetic lineages1. But the small number of aDNA samples that predate the Last Glacial Maximum means that the origins of these lineages are not well understood. Here, we circumvent the limited sampling by modelling explicitly the effect of climatic changes and terrain on population demography and migrations through time and space, and show that these factors are sufficient to explain the divergence among ancestral lineages. Our reconstructions show that the sharp separation between African and Eurasian lineages is a consequence of only a few limited periods of connectivity through the arid Arabian peninsula, which acted as the gate out of the Arican continent. The subsequent spread across Eurasia was then mostly shaped by mountain ranges, and to a lesser extent deserts, leading to the split of European and Asians, and the further diversification of these two groups. A high tolerance to cold climates allowed the persistence at high latitudes even during the Last Glacial Maximum, maintaining a pocket in Beringia that led to the later, rapid colonisation of the Americas. The advent of food production was associated with an increase in movement2, but mountains and climate have been shown to still play a major role even in this latter period3,4, affecting the mixing of the ancestral lineages that we have shown to be shaped by those two factors in the first place.

Competing Interest Statement

The authors have declared no competing interest.

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The copyright holder for this preprint is the author/funder, who has granted bioRxiv a license to display the preprint in perpetuity. It is made available under a CC-BY-NC-ND 4.0 International license.
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Climate and mountains shaped human ancestral genetic lineages
Pierpaolo Maisano Delser, Mario Krapp, Robert Beyer, Eppie R Jones, Eleanor F Miller, Anahit Hovhannisyan, Michelle Parker, Veronika Siska, Maria Teresa Vizzari, Elizabeth J. Pearmain, Ivan Imaz-Rosshandler, Michela Leonardi, Gian Luigi Somma, Jason Hodgson, Eirlys Tysall, Zhe Xue, Lara Cassidy, Daniel G Bradley, Anders Eriksson, Andrea Manica
bioRxiv 2021.07.13.452067; doi: https://doi.org/10.1101/2021.07.13.452067
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Climate and mountains shaped human ancestral genetic lineages
Pierpaolo Maisano Delser, Mario Krapp, Robert Beyer, Eppie R Jones, Eleanor F Miller, Anahit Hovhannisyan, Michelle Parker, Veronika Siska, Maria Teresa Vizzari, Elizabeth J. Pearmain, Ivan Imaz-Rosshandler, Michela Leonardi, Gian Luigi Somma, Jason Hodgson, Eirlys Tysall, Zhe Xue, Lara Cassidy, Daniel G Bradley, Anders Eriksson, Andrea Manica
bioRxiv 2021.07.13.452067; doi: https://doi.org/10.1101/2021.07.13.452067

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