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The Huns suddenly appeared in Europe in the 370s, establishing one of the most influential although short-lived empires in Europe. Scholars have long debated whether the Huns were descended from the Xiongnu. In fact, the Xiongnu Empire dissolved around 100... leaving a 300-year gap before the Huns appeared in Europe. Can DNA lineages that bridge these three centuries be found?...researchers analyzed the DNA of 370 individuals that lived in historical periods spanning around 800 years... encompassing sites in the Mongolian steppe, Central Asia, and the Carpathian Basin of Central Europe. In particular, they examined 35 newly sequenced genomes ranging from:...

One of the most interesting things about humanity is how it manages to take something dangerous to it, and make it useful to itself. We took wolves and domesticated them, turning them into dogs, which have done everything from help us hunt, find dangerous items, warn us of impending danger, or even just sit on our laps and lower our blood pressure. Mankind does a lot of things with its miraculous intelligence, but one of the things it's actually best at is taming that which threatens us. And it looks like mankind has now gotten around to taming one of...

It was late in 1972 — a year in which the science of genetic engineering really began to sizzle — that two California researchers announced the unusually tidy transfer of genetic information from one bacterium to another with help from a specialized enzyme. It was a scientifically heralded result, but behind the hoopla was just one small catch. The information transferred enabled a common human disease bacterium, E. coli, to resist not just one antibiotic, but two. “Alarm bells should have rung,” writes Matthew Cobb, in his deeply researched and often deeply troubling history of gene science. And that nothing...

After nearly 80 years, the remains of 2nd Lt. Robert T. McCollum, a U.S. Army Air Forces bombardier who went missing in action during World War II, have been identified. The Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency (DPAA) officially confirmed McCollum’s identification on December 10, 2024, bringing long-awaited closure to his family.McCollum, from Cleveland, Ohio, served in the 565th Bombardment Squadron, 389th Bombardment Group, 2nd Combat Bomb Wing, 2nd Air Division, 8th Air Force...In 2019, divers from Denmark discovered wreckage of a WWII plane near the last known location of McCollum’s plane, leading to a significant breakthrough. Among the items retrieved was...

A new study of the 37,000-year old remains of the "Deep Skull" - the oldest modern human discovered in island South-East Asia - has revealed this ancient person was not related to Indigenous Australians, as had been originally thought. The Deep Skull was also likely to have been an older woman, rather than a teenage boy. The research, led by UNSW Australia Associate Professor Darren Curnoe, represents the most detailed investigation of the ancient cranium specimen since it was found in Niah Cave in Sarawak in 1958. "Our analysis overturns long-held views about the early history of this region," says...

A woolly mouse, a breed created by scientists using genetic engineering. The development is a first step toward reviving a version of the extinct woolly mammoth. Colossal Biosciences Scientists have genetically engineered mice with some key characteristics of an extinct animal that was far larger — the woolly mammoth. This "woolly mouse" marks an important step toward achieving the researchers' ultimate goal — bringing a woolly mammoth-like creature back from extinction, they say. "For us, it's an incredibly big deal," says Beth Shapiro, chief science officer at Colossal Biosciences, a Dallas company trying to resurrect the woolly mammoth and other...

I have been talking to my Mother, Thanks Blam, about getting a DNA test to deturmine heritige. AB Negitive is a rare blood type in Ireland, less than 1%. I have been wondering about the distribution of this Blood Type among people descended from those who emmigrated from Northern Ireland. My Mother is Black Irish, Not Protestant, Black Hair, Dark Brown Eyes, Olive Skin, not your normal Harp. My Nana said it was the milk man, not likely!

The subject of the Ten Lost Tribes of Israel has fascinated Biblical researchers for centuries, if not longer. One theory which started becoming popular in the sixteenth century is that some, if not all, of these Ten Tribes migrated to ancient Britain. The theory is much less popular today than it once was. However, it has experienced something of a resurgence in recent decades. According to proponents of the theory connecting the Israelites to the Britons, the Cimmerians can be identified as the deported Israelites. There are two main pieces of evidence for this. The first is that they appear...

"We don't need bones," Straus said. "The results show that several animals not represented by bones from the dig were present—either once living in the cave or as carcass pieces—in the past and, importantly, the humans who made the Solutrean artifacts during the height of the Last Glacial Maximum (about 25,000 to 21,000 years ago) had 'Fournol' genetic ancestry, as has been found in bones or teeth from sites in France and Spain (including La Riera in Asturias, a site dug by Straus in the 1970s). These were the people whose range had contracted southward during the climatic crisis and...

In a major ruling, the judge overseeing the case of the man charged with killing four Idaho college students in 2022 has denied a request to exclude potentially key DNA and other evidence from his upcoming capital murder trial. Lawyers for Bryan Kohberger had sought to suppress DNA evidence that was seen as a linchpin of prosecutors' case against him -- evidence they say directly links Kohberger to the crime scene. In addition, lawyers sought to exclude data obtained from various online accounts like Apple, Google and Amazon belonging to Kohberger; his apartment in Washington; and his parents' Pennsylvania home.

Scientists today released what they say is the biggest-ever artificial-intelligence (AI) model for biology. The model — which was trained on 128,000 genomes spanning the tree of life, from humans to single-celled bacteria and archaea — can write whole chromosomes and small genomes from scratch. It can also make sense of existing DNA, including hard-to-interpret ‘non-coding’ gene variants that are linked to disease. Evo-2, co-developed by researchers at the Arc Institute and Stanford University, both in Palo Alto, California, and chip maker NVIDIA, is available to scientists through web interfaces or they can download its freely available software code, data...

SGT David Eugene Hardy was born on Nov 1, 1928 and died on Feb 28, 1951 as a POW at Camp 5, Pyoktong, North Korea. Under Operation Glory his remains were exchanged in 1954. The Central Identification Unit at Kokura, Japan was unable to associate remains with Sargent Hardy and the remains were sent to Honolulu for burial as Unknown in the National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific, in Honolulu, Hawaii, in 1956. In 2019 his remains were disinterred and sent to Hickam AFB for analysis. SGT David E. Hardy was ultimately identified on 27 September 2024. David's father and...

The nearly complete skeleton, with severed feet and a pugio on the back, leaves the cause of death and burial a "real mystery." Archaeologists excavating a 4,900-year-old fortress in Almendralejo, southwestern Spain, have uncovered the burial of a man who may have been a Roman soldier. The solitary, shallow grave was discovered near one of the defensive ditches of the ancient fortress and contained the remains of a man between 25 and 35 years old, laid face down with a pugio—a Roman dagger—on his back. The dagger was found completely intact and still in its sheath. It has been dated...

For hundreds of years, history left us wondering what disease killed the Aztecs in the mid-1500s. Many assumed the Aztecs were one of many Central American groups to be wiped out by European diseases like smallpox. However, DNA testing has unearthed new evidence about what really killed 80% of the Aztecs. Scientists extracted DNA from Aztec teeth, and discovered the presence of a strand of Salmonella. Research on climate change in Mexico at the time indicates droughts could have precipitated the spread of disease. Some things remain unexplained, however; only continued research can explain how a massive epidemic ravaged the...

For the first time, analyses determine that some present-day Kenyans who identify as Swahili are genetically very different from medieval residents of the same region, while others have retained substantial medieval ancestry...The researchers found that the initial waves of newcomers were mainly from Persia. These findings align with the oldest Swahili oral stories, which tell of Persian (Shirazi) merchants or princes arriving on the Swahili shores."It was exciting to find biological evidence that Swahili oral history probably depicts Swahili genetic ancestry as well as cultural legacy," said Esther Brielle, research fellow in genetics in the Reich lab.Brielle is co-first author...

Science Magazine reports that Robert Kelly of the University of Wyoming and his colleagues compiled more than 60,000 radiocarbon dates for artifacts from the United States and Canada. Then, assuming that the amount of radiocarbon data collected from a given region reflects its population at that time, the researchers made comparisons between the possible size of the populations over time and between regions. The study suggests that North American populations grew for about 2,000 years and peaked around A.D. 1150, then the size of the population decreased by at least 30 percent by 1500. Yet populations grew and declined in...

Paleoanthropologists from the University of Vienna and Harvard University have analyzed ancient DNA from 435 individuals from Eurasian archaeological sites... They've discovered a previously unknown group, called Caucasus-Lower Volga (CLV) people, and found out that this population can be connected to all Indo-European-speaking populations.Indo-European languages, which number over 400 and include major groups such as Germanic, Romance, Slavic, Indo-Iranian, and Celtic, are spoken by nearly half the world's population today...These migrations out of the steppes had the largest effect on European human genomes of any demographic event in the last 5,000 years and are widely regarded as the probable vector...

Evidence from 2,000-year-old DNA reveals that women in Celtic society stayed in their ancestral communities after marriage, whereas men were mobile, and that the southern coast of Britain was a hotspot for cultural exchange.Marriage practices, particularly those that define where spouses live (and die) after marriage, are fundamental to human societies. These patterns shape perceptions of family, tribe and clan, influence community belonging and regulate land ownership. Anthropologists have long studied such practices globally, finding that patrilocality — in which a married woman moves to her male partner's community — is the most common. However, it remains unknown how deeply...

The FBI has approved changes to the Quality Assurance Standards (QAS) for Forensic Laboratories to allow DNA evidence profiles generated by Rapid DNA analysis to be searched against the national DNA database (CODIS). On January 27, the QAS documents were posted on the website of the Scientific Working Group on DNA Analysis Methods (SWGDAM), announcing that the new standards will have an effective date of July 1, 2025. At least seven states (Arizona, Connecticut, Kentucky, Missouri, New Jersey, Oklahoma, and Pennsylvania) have already taken proactive steps to support criminal investigations by creating non-CODIS statewide programs to allow crime scene evidence...

Circular mammoth bone structures have been recovered across western Russia and the Ukraine. Most have been dated to around ~26,000–14,000 cal BP (calibrated years before present) and are usually found along the Desna/Dnpr river systems."The circular mammoth bone structures are from the height of the last Ice Age, a period of intense cold, and are widely considered to have been dwellings for shelter during long, full glacial winter seasons or possibly year-round," explains Dr. Lorenzen, one of the study's researchers...However, precisely what they looked like is yet unknown...Previous radiocarbon dates indicate the site was likely built around 24,000–25,000 ya. Making...