Publications by authors named "Krzysztof Tunia"
Article Synopsis
- The study analyzes 317 ancient genomes from Mesolithic and Neolithic periods across northern and western Eurasia to understand human migration impacts during the Holocene.* -
- Findings show a significant genetic divide between eastern and western populations, with the west experiencing major gene replacement due to the introduction of farming, while the east maintained its hunter-gatherer ancestry longer.* -
- The Yamnaya culture, which emerged around 5,000 BP, played a crucial role in spreading ancestry across western Eurasia, leading to significant genetic changes in European populations.*
The demographic history of East-Central Europe after the Neolithic period remains poorly explored, despite this region being on the confluence of various ecological zones and cultural entities. Here, the descendants of societies associated with steppe pastoralists form Early Bronze Age were followed by Middle Bronze Age populations displaying unique characteristics. Particularly, the predominance of collective burials, the scale of which, was previously seen only in the Neolithic.
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- The domestication of horses significantly changed mobility and warfare, but modern breeds do not trace back to the earliest domestic horses found in Central Asia around 3500 BC.
- Research reestablishes the Western Eurasian steppes, particularly the lower Volga-Don area, as the origin of modern domestic horses, based on genetic analysis from 273 ancient horse genomes.
- The study finds that the spread of modern domestic horses around 2000 BC coincided with the emergence of equestrian cultures, refuting the idea that horseback riding was linked to the expansion of Yamnaya pastoralists in Europe.
Article Synopsis
- DNA hybridization-capture techniques help researchers focus on specific genomic regions, which is particularly beneficial for studying ancient DNA (aDNA) that often contains more environmental DNA than the target material.
- hyRAD is introduced as a budget-friendly, design-free method that uses double enzymatic restriction to create RNA probes for capturing targeted regions in aDNA, yielding impressive results from samples with low endogenous content.
- The study highlights the effectiveness of hyRAD, noting that it can enhance data quality and coverage, and has developed an automated protocol to streamline processing, making it a viable option for reconstructing ancestral genetic data.
From around 4,000 to 2,000 BC the forest-steppe north-western Pontic region was occupied by people who shared a nomadic lifestyle, pastoral economy and barrow burial rituals. It has been shown that these groups, especially those associated with the Yamnaya culture, played an important role in shaping the gene pool of Bronze Age Europeans, which extends into present-day patterns of genetic variation in Europe. Although the genetic impact of these migrations from the forest-steppe Pontic region into central Europe have previously been addressed in several studies, the contribution of mitochondrial lineages to the people associated with the Corded Ware culture in the eastern part of the North European Plain remains contentious.
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