Palaeogenomes of Eurasian straight-tusked elephants challenge the current view of elephant evolution.
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Abstract | The straight-tusked elephants spp. were widespread across Eurasia during the Pleistocene. Phylogenetic reconstructions using morphological traits have grouped them with Asian elephants (), and many paleontologists place within . Here, we report the recovery of full mitochondrial genomes from four and partial nuclear genomes from two 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 was a close relative of extant African forest elephants (). Species previously referred to are thus most parsimoniously explained as having diverged from the lineage of , indicating that has not been constrained to Africa. Our results demonstrate that the current picture of elephant evolution is in need of substantial revision. |
Year of Publication | 2017
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Journal | Elife
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Volume | 6
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Date Published | 2017 06 06
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ISSN | 2050-084X
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DOI | 10.7554/eLife.25413
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PubMed ID | 28585920
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PubMed Central ID | PMC5461109
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Grant list | Wellcome Trust / United Kingdom
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