The Population History of Domestic Sheep Revealed by Paleogenomes

Sheep was one of the first domesticated animals in Neolithic West Eurasia. The zooarchaeological record suggests that domestication first took place in Southwest Asia, although much remains unresolved about the precise location(s) and timing(s) of earliest domestication, or the post-domestication history of sheep. Here, we present 24 new partial sheep paleogenomes, including a 13,000-year-old Epipaleolithic Central Anatolian wild sheep, as well as 14 domestic sheep from Neolithic Anatolia, two from Neolithic Iran, two from Neolithic Iberia, three from Neolithic France, and one each from Late Neolithic/Bronze Age Baltic and South Russia, in addition to five present-day Central Anatolian Mouflons and two present-day Cyprian Mouflons. We find that Neolithic European, as well as domestic sheep breeds, are genetically closer to the Anatolian Epipaleolithic sheep and the present-day Anatolian and Cyprian Mouflon than to the Iranian Mouflon. This supports a Central Anatolian source for domestication, presenting strong evidence for a domestication event in SW Asia outside the Fertile Crescent, although we cannot rule out multiple domestication events also within the Neolithic Fertile Crescent. We further find evidence for multiple admixture and replacement events, including one that parallels the Pontic Steppe-related ancestry expansion in Europe, as well as a post-Bronze Age event that appears to have further spread Asia-related alleles across global sheep breeds. Our findings mark the dynamism of past domestic sheep populations in their potential for dispersal and admixture, sometimes being paralleled by their shepherds and in other cases not.

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UNC Libraries
Published
2024-10-31
DOI
https://doi.org/10.17615/w5d9-6a75
Primary Topic
Genetic and phenotypic traits in livestock
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article
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The Population History of Domestic Sheep Revealed by Paleogenomes

Ayça Küçükakdağ Doğu, Gözde Atağ, Rana Özbal, Erhan Bıçakçı et al.
UNC Libraries
Genetic and phenotypic traits in livestock
article

The Population History of Domestic Sheep Revealed by Paleogenomes

Ayça Küçükakdağ Doğu, Gözde Atağ, Rana Özbal, Erhan Bıçakçı, Thierry Grange, Bea De Cupere, Maria A. Ochir-Goryaeva, Anders Götherström, Yasin Gökhan Çakan, Sevgi Yorulmaz, Torsten Günther, Füsun Özer, Duygu Deniz Kazancı, Gülsün Umurtak, Mehmet Somel, Can Yumni Gündem, Lamys Hachem, İnci̇ Togan, Fatma Küçük Baloğlu, Eleftherios Hadjisterkotis, Javad Hosseinzadeh, Evangelia Pişkin, Refik Duru, Benjamin S. Arbuckle, Eva-María Geigl, Özlem Çevik, Mohammad Foad Abazari, Pedro Morell Miranda, Kıvılcım Başak Vural, Viktoria V. Kukanova, Eren Yüncü, Fokke Gerritsen, Ali Akbaba, Damla Kaptan, Aleksey Buluktaev, Douglas Baird, Hamid Reza Valipour, Kayra Canpolat, Zohre Fakhari
article en

Abstract

Sheep was one of the first domesticated animals in Neolithic West Eurasia. The zooarchaeological record suggests that domestication first took place in Southwest Asia, although much remains unresolved about the precise location(s) and timing(s) of earliest domestication, or the post-domestication history of sheep. Here, we present 24 new partial sheep paleogenomes, including a 13,000-year-old Epipaleolithic Central Anatolian wild sheep, as well as 14 domestic sheep from Neolithic Anatolia, two from Neolithic Iran, two from Neolithic Iberia, three from Neolithic France, and one each from Late Neolithic/Bronze Age Baltic and South Russia, in addition to five present-day Central Anatolian Mouflons and two present-day Cyprian Mouflons. We find that Neolithic European, as well as domestic sheep breeds, are genetically closer to the Anatolian Epipaleolithic sheep and the present-day Anatolian and Cyprian Mouflon than to the Iranian Mouflon. This supports a Central Anatolian source for domestication, presenting strong evidence for a domestication event in SW Asia outside the Fertile Crescent, although we cannot rule out multiple domestication events also within the Neolithic Fertile Crescent. We further find evidence for multiple admixture and replacement events, including one that parallels the Pontic Steppe-related ancestry expansion in Europe, as well as a post-Bronze Age event that appears to have further spread Asia-related alleles across global sheep breeds. Our findings mark the dynamism of past domestic sheep populations in their potential for dispersal and admixture, sometimes being paralleled by their shepherds and in other cases not.

UNC Libraries
University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill (US)
National Science Foundation, Harvard University, Svenska Forskningsrådet Formas, Fondation pour la Recherche Médicale, Vetenskapsrådet, Türkiye Bilimsel ve Teknolojik Araştırma Kurumu, Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, Hacettepe Üniversitesi, Norges Forskningsråd, Université Paris Diderot, Megagrants, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Horizon 2020 Framework Programme
Zero hunger
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Genetic and phenotypic traits in livestock
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