Fragments of the article:
DNA Analysis of... Neanderthal Bone...
by Michael D. O’Neill
Analysis
of mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) from the... rib of a Neanderthal infant indicates
that Neanderthals and modern humans probably did not interbreed, despite their
presumed coexistence in the same general area for thousands of years.
The
current analysis supports a 1997 finding, based on analysis of bone from a
Neanderthal skeleton found 145 years ago, that Neanderthal mtDNA is
significantly different from human mtDNA. The 1997 analysis had provided the
first molecular evidence that Neanderthals and modern humans should be
considered separate species.
Together,
the two independent analyses of mtDNA from two different Neanderthals, from two
different locations (see below), lend strong support to the
"displacement" theory of Neanderthal/modern human interaction. This
theory says the Neanderthals were displaced by modern humans without the
Neanderthals contributing any genes to the modern human gene pool.
Alternative
theories have suggested either that Neanderthals were the direct ancestors of
modern humans, or that Neanderthals and modern humans interbred to create the
current modern human gene pool. These theories are not supported by the current
findings on the Neanderthal mtDNA sequence, which suggest that the Neanderthals
contributed no mtDNA genes to the mtDNA gene pool of modern humans.
Neanderthals
should be equally distant... from all the different population groups of modern
humans (e.g., Africans, Mongoloids, and Caucasians). This prediction was borne
out by calculations carried out using the results of the current study, the
authors said.
The
archeological records indicate that modern humans and Neanderthals may have
coexisted in the same general area... at the end of the Neanderthal period. The
question of whether and how Neanderthals and modern humans might have
interacted during this period of overlap has been hotly debated for some time.
The
first analysis of Neanderthal mtDNA sequence was reported in 1997 (Krings, M.
et al., Cell 90: 19-30, July 11,1997). In this work, DNA was extracted from
pulverized bone from the first-discovered Neanderthal skeleton, which was found
in the Feldhofer Cave in the Neander Valley near Dusseldorf, Germany, in 1856.
Sequence
analysis of the mtDNA extracted from this skeleton revealed 27 nucleotide
differences between the Feldhofer Neanderthal mtDNA sequence and a modern human
reference mtDNA sequence (the Anderson sequence)
in a 360-base-pair (bp) region of hypervariable region 1 (HVR1) of the mtDNA
genome. The average number of variations observed between mtDNA from different
population groups of modern humans in this same region was approximately 8
nucleotides. [Note: In this first Neanderthal mtDNA study, the sequence of the
HVR1 region of the Neanderthal mtDNA was inferred from the sequences of
multiple small clones.]
This Feldhofer mtDNA sequence data strongly suggested that
Neanderthals and modern humans were distinct species and that Neanderthals did
not contribute genes to the mtDNA gene pool of modern humans. But, because this
was the first-ever analysis of Neanderthal DNA, many believed that independent
confirmation was necessary.
In a companion piece (Cell 90: 1-3, July 11, 1997) to this first
report of Neanderthal mtDNA sequencing, Dr. Tomas Lindahl, of the Imperial
Cancer Research (ICR) Fund, had said "It is now of great importance to attempt
to verify the present results with a second Neanderthal bone from a different
location."
This independent verification is precisely what has now been
provided with the results published on the mtDNA sequence from a second
Neanderthal.
The infant rib bone that served as the source of mtDNA for the
current study was recovered by a Russian expedition from the Moscow Institute
of Archeology and the Moskovskii Prospekt Institute (St. Petersburg) during
excavation of the Mezmaiskaya Cave (a limestone cave) on a bank of the Sukhoy
Kurdhips river in the northern Caucasus Mountains.
The Caucasus Mountains stretch for 900 miles between the Black
Sea and the Caspian Sea, and separate Europe and Asia in this region. The
Caucasus region is believed to be one of the areas through which pre-modern and
modern humans may have entered Europe from the Near East and Africa... The
Mezmaiskaya Cave is located approximately 1,560 miles southeast of the
Feldhofer Cave.
One sample from the Mezmaiskaya bone was brought to Dr.
Goodwin’s lab in Scotland by Dr. Igor Ovchinnikov, of the Institute of
Gerontology in Moscow, and it was Dr. Ovchinnikov who undertook the DNA
extraction and amplification.
Another sample was sent to the lab of Dr. Anders Gotherstrom in
the Archeological Research Laboratory of Stockholm University in Sweden, for
independent analysis... it had come from one of the latest-living Neanderthals.
(T)he Glasgow group was able to determine a consensus sequence
for 345 bp of the HVR1 region of mtDNA from the Mezmaiskaya bone sample. This
sequence was determined from two overlapping PCR fragments with lengths of 232
bp and 256 bp. The 256-bp fragment represents that largest fragment of
Neanderthal mtDNA ever generated in a PCR reaction, the authors noted.
Analysis of the consensus sequence indicated that the
Mezmaiskaya mtDNA was significantly different from the modern human sequence,
and more similar to the mtDNA sequence of the Feldhofer Neanderthal.
A total of 22 differences between the Mezmaiskaya and the modern
human reference sequence (Anderson) were identified. A total of just 12
differences were seen between the mtDNA sequences of the two Neanderthal
specimens. Both Neanderthal sequences showed substitutions at the same 19
positions relative to the modern human reference sequence, the authors noted.
This data strongly suggested that the Mezmaiskaya Neanderthal
should be placed phylogenetically in a group distinct from modern humans. The
data further suggested that the Feldhofer and Mezmaiskaya Neanderthals should
be placed together in the same group.
The analysis also strongly suggested that Neanderthals did not
contribute mtDNA genes to the human mtDNA gene pool and argued against the
possibility that the two groups had interbred. As noted earlier, however, these
results cannot exclude the possibility that Neanderthals contributed nuclear
genes to the human gene pool.
The authors noted that analysis of the other Mezmaiskaya sample,
carried out by the Archeology Research Laboratory in Sweden, had yielded
results congruent with those obtained by the Glasgow laboratory.
The authors pointed out that preservation of a 256-bp mtDNA
fragment in bone... (so) old, that has not been preserved in permafrost, and
that contained sufficient DNA to enable direct DNA sequencing after
amplification, is unprecedented. They suggest that this remarkable instance of
DNA preservation may be attributed to specific features of the microenvironment
in the Mezmaiskaya limestone cave.
The authors further suggest that their results imply that
additional analyses of material from the Mezmaiskaya bone sample may permit
elucidation of the entire mtDNA sequence of the Neanderthal mitochondrial
genome.
The collaborating scientists authoring this report came from the
Institute of Archeology, the Institute and Museum of Anthropology of Moscow
State University, and the Institute of Gerontology, all located in Moscow,
Russia; from the Human Identification Centre, at the University of Glasgow, in
Glasgow, Scotland; and from the Archeological Research Laboratory of Stockholm
University in Stockholm, Sweden.
Ovchinnikov, I.V. et al., Nature 404: 490-493 (March 30, 2000).
One allegory of the “Neanderthal cities”:
Limestones in the Caucasus Mountanis
An extra allegory of the Neanderthals: some Anasazi Colonies:
Other skull of “Neanderthal”:
http://www.oocities.org/fdocch/nskull.jpg
Tasters of the Word (YouTube), videos recientes: "Astronomía y Nacimiento de Jesucristo: Once de Septiembre Año Tres A.C.", "Estudio sobre Sanidades" (en 20 episodios), "Jesus Christ, Son or God?" and "We've the Power to Heal":
Tasters of the Word (the blog, with: "Astronomy and the Birth of Jesus Christ"):
