The @scilifelab.se Ancient DNA Unit is recruiting a (permanent) Research Engineer for planning user projects and generating #aDNA 🧬 data:
Application deadline: March 25th 🧪🏺
www.uu.se/en/about-uu/...
#Call for #Applications: #HumanPast #SCAS #Fellowships 2027-28 for both #early-career and senior #interdisciplinary researchers. Deadline: 1 June 2026. More information on our web: shorturl.at/VAAfl #humanpast #opportunity #genetics #archaeology #linguistics #prehistory @haam-community.bsky.social
Excited to share our study in GENETICS on exploring biological kinship in ancient DNA data sets (doi.org/10.1093/gene...).
Using ERGMs to find variables that correlate with relatedness, and applied to 6th-9th century Avar, we find evidence for female exogamy and the existence of an elite class.
📣 Closing this thriving department would deal a significant blow to archaeology in German-speaking countries. Please sign and share! #AcademicSky #Archaeology 🏺
New preprint! with @a-solernunez.bsky.social
Rethinking a textbook example of human adaptation "AMY1 copy number evolution in light of demographic history"
Once population structure is accounted for, the classic starch–agriculture narrative becomes much less clear
www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...
Exciting new #aDNA study on genetic relatedness in Neolithic hunter‑gatherer co‑burials is now published in #ProcB @royalsociety.org 🏺🧬🧪
Great team involving our own T. Mattila, M. Fraser, J. Koelman, M. Jakobsson, @trstrstrs.bsky.social and H. Malmström
royalsocietypublishing.org/rspb/article...
Are you interested in human DNA from ancient sediments? Do you want to do a PhD in Vienna? We have two open positions in our group! You can learn more and apply here (scroll down to the very bottom, ours are the last two listings): careers.univie.ac.at/en/praedoc/s...
Fun news! @gcbias.bsky.social and I are teaching a 2-week online population genetics workshop this summer to raise money for the Center for Population Biology at UC Davis. We're trying to gauge interest -- please fill this out if you might be interested! And please share broadly!
New preprint on bioRxiv: an evaluation of epigenetic age-at-death inference in ancient human DNA, highlighting current limitations and future directions.
El último paper de mi tesis está ya publicado en forma de preprint! Os parece si lo comentamos un poco? www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...
This has been a multi-year project with a diverse and fun team from 🇪🇸🇸🇪🇹🇷🇮🇹 - always fun to work with these people!
@humanevouu.bsky.social @compevohumang.bsky.social @admexture.bsky.social (and many more, I don't have all bluesky handles right now)
(8/8)
admixture graph showing a simplified version of the history of Iberian sheep with three introductions of sheep into Iberia or the Iberian gene pool
The history of sheep in Iberia has been very dynamic, maybe more dynamic than many other places where we see long continuity. Also more dynamic than humans or other domestics, (afawk). And it's always been humans preferring a different type of sheep, likely for better wool or other products.
(7/8)
f4 statistic measuring eastern ancestry in modern sheep breeds relative to Roman Age Iberia. Only northern European and non-European show an excess of Eastern ancestry compared to the Roman reference
In fact, we see no substantial genetic influx into Iberia (e.g. Merino or Churra breeds) after the Roman samples. So maybe they were introduced around that time and then became popular across Europe during historical times.
(6/8)
Also Bronze and Roman Age seem genetically different from previous periods. In the Roman Age, we see a high similarity to modern breeds such as Merino coinciding with a shift towards eastern Mediterranean ancestry. Did the Romans bring fine wool sheep into Iberia? (5/8)
(Photo: Fir0002, GFDL 1.2)
f4 statistics showing eastern ancestry in Iberian sheep (top) and humans (bottom). Both species show an increase in eastern ancestry just after 5000 years ago
But this wasn't the last time people brought sheep to Iberia. We see two genetic shifts during the Chalcolithic around 5kya. One of them also coincides with the arrival of human (Pontic-Caspian) steppe ancestry in the region. Why new sheep? They were probably better for some reason - wool? 🧶
(4/8)
Photo of a European mouflon, a ferialized relative of domestic sheep with big horns and hairy coat
That confirms these mouflons as ferialized versions of early domestic sheep and they look very little like how we know sheep today, e.g. no wool 🧶 (3/8)
(Photo: Jonathan Hornung, CC BY-SA 2.0 DE)
We sequenced DNA 🧬 from prehistoric Iberian sheep remains 🦴 spanning from the Neolithic to Roman times. 🐏 were first introduced to Iberia around 7.5k years ago. These early western Mediterranean sheep show remarkable genetic similarity to European mouflon now found in Corsica and Sardinia (2/8)
Excited and proud 😊 to share the final chapter of @hjorvik.bsky.social 's PhD thesis:
Seven Millennia of Human Exploitation drove genomic Changes in Iberian Sheep
Comments welcome! 🧬🧪🏺🐑
www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...
🧵(1/8)
Uppsala in late autumn
Join us at the Evolutionary Biology Centre at Uppsala University. We’re searching for an Assistant Professor in Biology. www.uu.se/en/about-uu/...
Looking forward to welcoming Mustafa soon @humanevouu.bsky.social 🎉😊
We are looking for an enthusiast and motivated postdoc to join the Paleogenomics and Evolutionary Biology group at @liigh-unam.bsky.social, to lead a project working with human pre-hispanic samples. Interested candidates send a CV and letter of intent to fsanchez@liigh.unam.mx. Please #RT
📣 The @scilifelab.se #ddls postdoc (2yrs) offers a great community + training + all social benefits!
Happy to discuss your own project ideas! I also have some ideas on ARGs, pangenomes or biobank-scale datasets 🧬🐏🧪🖥️
Deadline is Mar 31 but some admin things need to be handled well in advance!
📣 We are seeking a postdoctoral research fellow in ancient metagenomics. Join us at the Institute of Genomics, University of Tartu.
⏳ 01.04.2026–31.03.2028
📚 1.0 position
📍 Riia 23b, Tartu, Estonia
ℹ️ Project: lnkd.in/dQARuBxM
ℹ️ Application: lnkd.in/dFR8DQxH
⏰ Deadline 02.02.2026
Lin et al. assess the impact of sequencing depth when mapping ancient DNA data and in silico modern and ancient-like DNA data, showing that depths >100X fail to yield stable heterozygosity estimates, and leave ~4% of the genome uncovered.
🔗 doi.org/10.1093/gbe/evaf251
#genome #evolution
SciLifeLab has opened a call for #postdoc fellows in Data-Driven Life Science. We would be happy to host such fellows!
Get in touch if you are interested in applying with a project on the evolution of humans and domestic animals using ancient and/or modern DNA 🧪🏺
www.scilifelab.se/data-driven/...
Portrait of Brenna Henn next to an open freezer of samples.
Here's my latest contribution to the @nytimes "Lost Science" series. Brenna Henn's sweeping study of African genetics has been frozen. Gift link: nyti.ms/3Ypmm1A
Oh, look! My friends around Magdalena Fraser & Federico Sanchez-Quinto et al have a new study analyzing more high-coverage Neolithic #aDNA genomes from the Baltic island of Gotland (including pathogens!!!) 👀 🧪 🏺
www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...
😲 time flies
Our new ancient DNA paper has just been published!
We present 28 new genomes from southern Africa - several of them high-coverage whole genomes.
Exciting to be moving towards population-level representation of ancient southern African genetic diversity!
www.nature.com/articles/s41...
