Paleontology: Genomic sequencing of pleistocene cave bears
- Author(s)
- James P. Noonan, Michael Hofreiter, Doug Smith, James R Priest, Nadin Rohland, Gernot Rabeder, Johannes Krause, James Chris Detter, Svante Pääbo, Edward M Rubin
- Abstract
Despite the greater information content of genomic DNA, ancient DNA studies have largely been limited to the amplification of mitochondrial sequences. Here we describe metagenomic libraries constructed with unamplified DNA extracted from skeletal remains of two 40,000-year-old extinct cave bears. Analysis of ~1 megabase of sequence from each library showed that despite significant microbial contamination, 5.8 and 1.1% of clones contained cave bear inserts, yielding 26,861 base pairs of cave bear genome sequence. Comparison of cave bear and modern bear sequences revealed the evolutionary relationship of these lineages. The metagenomic approach used here establishes the feasibility of ancient DNA genome sequencing programs.
- Organisation(s)
- Department of Palaeontology
- External organisation(s)
- Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, Max-Planck-Institut für evolutionäre Anthropologie, Stanford University, Thomas Jefferson National Accelerator Facility
- Journal
- Science
- Volume
- 309
- Pages
- 597-600
- No. of pages
- 4
- ISSN
- 0036-8075
- Publication date
- 2005
- Peer reviewed
- Yes
- Austrian Fields of Science 2012
- 105118 Palaeontology
- Portal url
- https://ucrisportal.univie.ac.at/en/publications/7785f282-6fe1-4d2b-80ab-b6dd0376769e