Prehistoric genomes from Yunnan reveal ancestry related to Tibetans and Austroasiatic speakers
The human landscape in East and Southeast Asia is vastly complex, and successful retrieval of genome-wide data from prehistoric humans of southern East Asia is sparse. We successfully sampled 127 ancient human genomes from southwestern China. A 7100-year-old female individual from central Yunnan shows a previously unsampled Basal Asian ancestry related to a ghost population that contributed to Tibetan Plateau populations. Central Yunnan populations dating to 5500 to 1400 years before present show an East Asian ancestry distinct from northern or southern East Asian ancestries that contributed to present-day East and Southeast Asians, particularly Austroasiatic speakers, and emphasizes the importance of the Red River valley for proto-Austroasiatic population history. Diverse Asian ancestries are represented in humans sampled from Yunnan, clarifying past population dynamics related to both Tibetan and Austroasiatic origins.
Authors
- Qingyan Dai
- Leo Speidel (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4644-8033)
- Minmin Ma (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-5054-5733)
- Fan Bai (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-2045-366X)
- Lihong Kang
- Melinda A. Yang (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-9004-7563)
- Guanghui Dong (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-8005-759X)
- Rui Min (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4036-2933)
- Zhilong Jiang (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-6217-5082)
- Ranchao Zhou
- Qiaomei Fu (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-7141-0002)
- Haibing Yuan (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-3155-6760)
- Dongyue Zhao (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-3493-0535)
- Peng Cao (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-2044-3074)
- Ruowei Yang (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-6438-4635)
- Mark Stoneking (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-9044-6679)
- Xiaohong Wu (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-3819-0829)
- Xiaotian Feng (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-4893-2942)
- Z.M. Zhu (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-8092-3582)
- Wanjing Ping (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-4318-0673)
- Xu Liu (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-0473-3143)
- Tianyi Wang (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4790-7668)
- Feng Liu (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-5774-900X)
- Yichen Liu (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-7187-6232)
- Changcheng Hu
- Xiaorui Li (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-0627-3101)
- Fan Yang (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-0100-9296)
- Ming Zhang (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-2672-8860)
- Han Shi (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0009-0007-5280-2944)
- Yang Wan
Institutions
- Université Claude Bernard Lyon 1 (FR)
- Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (FR)
- University of Richmond (US)
- Chinese Academy of Sciences (CN)
- Peking University (CN)
- Sichuan University (CN)
- State Administration of Cultural Heritage (CN)
- The Francis Crick Institute (GB)
- Northwest University (CN)
- Institute of Vertebrate Paleontology and Paleoanthropology (CN)
- Yunnan Archaeology (CN)
- Laboratoire de Biométrie et Biologie Evolutive (FR)
- Genomics (United Kingdom) (GB)
- Institute of Earth Environment (CN)
- University of Chinese Academy of Sciences (CN)
- University College London (GB)
- Lanzhou University (CN)
Publication Details
- Journal
- Science
- Published
- 2025-05-29
- DOI
- https://doi.org/10.1126/science.adq9792
- Citations
- 22
- Primary Topic
- Forensic and Genetic Research
- Type
- article
- Field-Weighted Citation Impact
- 39.98