Scientists Recovered 22,000-Year-Old Human DNA From Cave Dirt
Scientists have successfully extracted ancient human DNA from sediment samples in Spain's El Mirón Cave, dating back 22,000 years. This breakthrough allows researchers to study human history even in the absence of physical skeletal remains.
Why it matters
This technique, known as sedaDNA, could revolutionize archaeology by providing genetic data from sites previously considered barren of human evidence.
Scientists are getting astonishingly good at extracting ancient human DNA from mere dirt and dust, even when there are no physical remains left…
A small scoop of sediment from a cave in Spain has now offered up ancient DNA from several individuals who lived roughly 22,000 years ago.
No human remains exist in this layer of the El Mirón Cave, but that hasn't stopped scientists.
The sediment taken from the El Mirón Cave weighed no more than a few grains of rice and had to be sequenced 100 times to yield enough usable data.
The team had to sift through more than a billion DNA fragments in the sample to find any human traces.
Plus, modern contamination had to be accounted for as well.
The findings from the study, led by researchers at the University of Vienna in Austria, are published in Science Advances .
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