[Explanation] Chinese scientists have found important genetic evidence for the exploration of the origin, formation and development of Chinese civilization by studying the whole genome data of 55 ancient Chinese people from 7500 to 1700 years ago.
The achievement was completed by the team of Cui Yinqiu of Jilin University in cooperation with many archaeological units, universities and research institutes at home and abroad. On the 1st of this month, the results were officially published in Nature-Newsletter. On June 2, Cui Yinqiu disclosed relevant details to the media for the first time.
Cui Yinqiu introduced that the research focused on the Yellow River Basin, the Xiliao River Basin and the Heilongjiang River Basin. Through the study of the whole genome data of 55 ancient people in northern China, from a multidisciplinary perspective of genetics, archaeology, historical comparative linguistics, Discussed the gene exchange among people in northern China.
Cui Yinqiu's research found that the ancient populations in these three river basins have obvious genetic differences, but the mixing and exchange of genes between the river basins has begun since the mid-Neolithic.
[Same period] (Cui Yinqiu, Professor of School of Life Sciences, Jilin University) In the Yellow River Basin, Xiliao River Basin and Heilongjiang River Basin, we collected continuous human bone samples of people from these three regions spanning nearly 6,000 years, and then extracted their DNA, And obtained their high-quality genome information. Our research can provide evidence of paleogenetics for the origin, formation and development of Chinese civilization.
[Explanation] Ning Chao, a member of the Cui Yinqiu team at Jilin University and a postdoctoral fellow at the Max Planck Institute for Human History Sciences in Germany, told reporters that ancient sample materials are very precious and difficult to obtain. In addition, their long-term exposure leads to serious degradation and damage to DNA molecules. Work becomes very challenging.
[Same period] (Ning Chao, member of the Cui Yinqiu team at Jilin University) Due to the long-term exposure of ancient DNA to the environment, the DNA has been severely degraded, the DNA fragments have become very short, and it is also susceptible to contamination by foreign DNA. So we adopted another method, through computer modeling, to make this very low-quality DNA can be used to track the population genome, analyze the population phenotype, the source of the population and the mixed mode analysis. In this case, we A resolution comparable to high-quality genomes can be obtained.
【Explanation】In recent years, the team of Cui Yinqiu of Jilin University has been devoted to the study of the intersection between ancient DNA and archaeology and linguistics, as well as the symbiotic mechanism, propagation and comparison of migration patterns of ancient pathogens and humans.
[Same period] (Cui Yinqiu, Professor of School of Life Sciences, Jilin University) The paleogenomics technology is not only applied to the communication and origin of ancient people, we can also apply the ancient DNA technology to, for example, paleomicrobiology, we can go after ancient times The outbreak occurred, its pathogenic bacteria, or the evolution (development and spread) process of the pathogenic bacteria.
Reporter Lu Shengnan from Changchun
Editor in charge: [Li Ji]