ancient DNA

Calculating the polygenic risk scores of ancient humans such as Ötzi the iceman helps researchers understand the genetic predisposition to cardiovascular disease.

Fossilized feces help scientists understand the lives of Puerto Rico’s earliest inhabitants.

This year’s stories highlight the expanding versatility of genetic techniques and the increasing utility of such research in all life science fields.

Researchers show how a toxic therapy helped identify a mummy using preserved DNA.

Researchers identified mutations in genes that may be involved in fat regulation, fur growth, and morphology.

The DNA fragments collected from permafrost in northern Greenland unlock insights into an ancient ecosystem.

The award highlights tremendous opportunities for aDNA as well as challenges related to rapid growth, equity, and misinformation.

The geneticist’s accomplishments include sequencing Neanderthal DNA and leading the project that identified a new species of hominin, the Denisovans.

The genome is from a male who was likely in his late thirties when the historic Mount Vesuvius eruption occurred. The analyses suggest he is related to the diverse Imperial Roman population of the time, and that he may have suffered from spinal tuberculosis.

The near-complete genome of a recently extinct rodent elucidates the potential—and difficulties—of resurrecting species.

Selected images from the-scientist.com

The oldest DNA yet isolated from humans in Africa reveals long-range migrations around 50,000 years ago, which likely played a role in the Middle to Later Stone Age transition.

The field of ancient DNA, which combines archaeology and anthropology with cutting-edge genetics, is requiring scientists to have frank conversations about when research is justified and who it benefits.

A genomics study reveals the parentage of a long-mysterious creature called a kunga, the earliest-known hybrid animal bred by humans.

Reconstructing the diet and microbiome of human ancestors shows an astonishingly rapid loss of microbiome diversity.

Scientists find human DNA preserved in lice cement from the heads of South American mummies.