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Palaeogenomes of Eurasian straight-tusked elephants challenge the current view of elephant evolution
Journal article

Palaeogenomes of Eurasian straight-tusked elephants challenge the current view of elephant evolution

  • Meyer, Matthias ORCID Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropolgy, Leipzig, Germany
  • Palkopoulou, Eleftheria Department of Genetics, Harvard Medical School, Boston, United States
  • Baleka, Sina Evolutionary Adaptive Genomics, Institute for Biochemistry and Biology, Department for Mathematics and Natural Sciences, University of Potsdam, Potsdam, Germany
  • Stiller, Mathias Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropolgy, Leipzig, Germany
  • Penkman, Kirsty E H ORCID Department of Chemistry, University of York, York, United Kingdom
  • Alt, Kurt W Department of Biomedical Engineering and Integrative Prehistory and Archaeological Science, Basel University, Basel, Switzerland
  • Ishida, Yasuko Department of Animal Sciences, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Urbana, United States
  • Mania, Dietrich State Office for Heritage Management and Archaeology Saxony-Anhalt with State Museum of Prehistory, Halle, Germany
  • Mallick, Swapan Department of Genetics, Harvard Medical School, Boston, United States
  • Meijer, Tom Naturalis Biodiversity Center, Leiden, Netherlands
  • Meller, Harald State Office for Heritage Management and Archaeology Saxony-Anhalt with State Museum of Prehistory, Halle, Germany
  • Nagel, Sarah Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropolgy, Leipzig, Germany
  • Nickel, Birgit Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropolgy, Leipzig, Germany
  • Ostritz, Sven Thüringisches Landesamt für Denkmalpflege und Archäologie, Weimar, Germany
  • Rohland, Nadin Department of Genetics, Harvard Medical School, Boston, United States
  • Schauer, Karol State Office for Heritage Management and Archaeology Saxony-Anhalt with State Museum of Prehistory, Halle, Germany
  • Schüler, Tim Thüringisches Landesamt für Denkmalpflege und Archäologie, Weimar, Germany
  • Roca, Alfred L Department of Animal Sciences, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Urbana, United States
  • Reich, David Howard Hughes Medical Institute, Harvard Medical School, Boston, United States
  • Shapiro, Beth Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, University of California, Santa Cruz, United States
  • Hofreiter, Michael Evolutionary Adaptive Genomics, Institute for Biochemistry and Biology, Department for Mathematics and Natural Sciences, University of Potsdam, Potsdam, Germany
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  • 2017-6-6
Published in:
  • eLife. - eLife Sciences Publications, Ltd. - 2017, vol. 6
English The straight-tusked elephants Palaeoloxodon spp. were widespread across Eurasia during the Pleistocene. Phylogenetic reconstructions using morphological traits have grouped them with Asian elephants (Elephas maximus), and many paleontologists place Palaeoloxodon within Elephas. Here, we report the recovery of full mitochondrial genomes from four and partial nuclear genomes from two P. antiquus fossils. These fossils were collected at two sites in Germany, Neumark-Nord and Weimar-Ehringsdorf, and likely date to interglacial periods ~120 and ~244 thousand years ago, respectively. Unexpectedly, nuclear and mitochondrial DNA analyses suggest that P. antiquus was a close relative of extant African forest elephants (Loxodonta cyclotis). Species previously referred to Palaeoloxodon are thus most parsimoniously explained as having diverged from the lineage of Loxodonta, indicating that Loxodonta has not been constrained to Africa. Our results demonstrate that the current picture of elephant evolution is in need of substantial revision.
Language
  • English
Open access status
gold
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Persistent URL
https://sonar.ch/global/documents/238272
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