scholarly journals Late Pleistocene palaeoecology and phylogeography of woolly rhinoceroses

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alba Rey-Iglesia ◽  
Adrian M. Lister ◽  
Anthony J. Stuart ◽  
Hervé Bocherens ◽  
Paul Szpak ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Late Pleistocene ◽  
Dna Sequences ◽  
Evolutionary Ecology ◽  
Environmental Stability ◽  
Before Present ◽  
East Siberia ◽  
Ovibos Moschatus ◽  
Woolly Rhinoceros ◽  
North East ◽  
Isotopic Records

AbstractThe woolly rhinoceros (Coelodonta antiquitatis) was a cold-adapted herbivore, widely distributed from western Europe to north-east Siberia during the Late Pleistocene. Previous studies associate the extinction of the species ~14,000 years before present to climatic and vegetational changes, and suggest that later survival of populations in north-east Siberia may relate to the later persistence of open vegetation in that region. Here, we analyzed carbon (δ13C) and nitrogen (δ15N) stable isotopes and mitochondrial DNA sequences to elucidate the evolutionary ecology of the species. Our dataset comprised 286 woolly rhinoceros isotopic records, including 192 unpublished records, from across the species range, dating from >58,600 14C years to ~14,000 years before present. Crucially, we present the first 71 isotopic records available to date of the 15,000 years preceding woolly rhinoceros extinction. The data reveal ecological flexibility and geographical variation in woolly rhinoceros stable isotope compositions through time. In north-east Siberia, we detected δ15N stability through time. This could reflect long-term environmental stability, and might have enabled the later survival of the species in the region. To further investigate the palaeoecology of woolly rhinoceroses, we compared their isotopic compositions with that of other contemporary herbivores. This analysis suggests possible niche partitioning between woolly rhinoceros and both horse (Equus spp.) and woolly mammoth (Mammuthus primigenius), and isotopic similarities between woolly rhinoceros and both musk ox (Ovibos moschatus) and saiga (Saiga tatarica) at different points in time. To provide phylogeographical context to the isotopic data, we analyzed 61 published mitochondrial control region sequences. The data show a lack of geographic structuring; we found three haplogroups with overlapping distributions, all of which show a signal of expansion during the Last Glacial Maximum. Furthermore, our genetic findings support the notion that environmental stability in Siberia had an impact on the paleoecology of woolly rhinoceroses in the region. Our study highlights the utility of combining stable isotopic records with ancient DNA to advance our knowledge of the evolutionary ecology of past populations and extinct species.

Yakut Governor Ivan Kraft and His Contribution to the Construction of the Amur-Yakutsk Highway at the Beginning of the 20th Century

2021 ◽  
pp. 94-97
Author(s):  
Lev M. Dameshek ◽  
◽  
Margarita D. Kushnareva ◽  
Keyword(s):  
20Th Century ◽  
Russian Federation ◽  
Interdisciplinary Approach ◽  
Research Problem ◽  
Strategic Decision ◽  
Asia Pacific ◽  
East Siberia ◽  
North East ◽  
The Russian Federation ◽  
The Government

The article considers the activities of Ivan Kraft, the governor of Yakutsk Oblast, on the incorporation of North-East Siberia into the single economic, administrative and sociocultural space of the Russian Empire. The aim of the study is to analyze Kraft's contribution to the construction and arrangement of the Amur-Yakutsk Highway at the beginning of the 20th century. To reach this aim, the authors broadly use archival sources that have not been previously published and introduced into academic discourse. The topic has theoretical and applied relevance. It has not been sufficiently studied in the historiography of North-East Siberia and is the subject of scholarly and political discussions. The key method in the study is an interdisciplinary approach to the research problem, which is at the intersection of history and economics. The authors used content analysis for a quantitative and qualitative study of these sources based on the principle of historicism and consistency. The authors determined that, in connection with the design of the Amur Railway, the Amur-Yakutsk Highway received the status of a strategic infrastructure object in the macroregion. The authors note that Kraft was the initiator of the construction of the route from Yakutsk to the Amur. The governor conducted a number of scientific and engineering surveys of the most convenient route and made applications for financing the construction of the highway. Kraft made a strategic decision to attract private companies with large capital for the construction. The Upper Amur Gold Mining Company and the Heirs of A. I. Gromova company helped build highway sections with a total length of more than 500 km, equip stations, establish telegraph communications, and construct river crossings. At the beginning of the 20th century, in the framework of modernization measures, Kraft considered Yakutsk Oblast as a mining region. This became the basis for raising the question of Yakutia's access to the Trans-Siberian Railway. The close cooperation of the government, in the person of Kraft, with large enterprises of the region was the basis for the project of constructing a railway line to Yakutsk. In conclusion, the authors note that the processes of incorporation of the Asian borderlands of Russia into the economic, administrative and sociocultural space of the state that Governor of Yakutsk Oblast Ivan Kraft began at the beginning of the 20th century were reflected in the modern policy of the Russian Federation. The Amur-Yakutsk Mainline was put into operation in 2015. At present, the problem of building a bridge across the Lena in the Yakutsk area is still relevant. In 2019, President of the Russian Federation Vladimir Putin signed orders to begin the construction of the bridge. This will create an international transit corridor between Europe and the Asia-Pacific region.

scholarly journals NEW DATA ON THE EXTENT OF THE LAST PLEISTOCENE GLACIATION IN THE GORNAYA SHORIA

2017 ◽  
Vol 2017 (3) ◽  
pp. 24-26
Author(s):  
Марина Адаменко ◽  
Marina Adamenko ◽  
Ярослав Гутак ◽  
Yaroslav Gutak ◽  
Богдан Воробьев ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Late Pleistocene ◽  
Field Research ◽  
Early Summer ◽  
Mountain Region ◽  
Pleistocene Glaciation ◽  
Mountain Valley ◽  
North East ◽  
Last Glaciation ◽  
Extreme North

The article presents and summarizes the results of a field research on glacial relief of the Gornaya Shoria mountain region, within the Patyn mountain massif. The Patyn-2017 expedition was organized by the Russian Geographic Society. This region has been very poorly studied in the paleogeographical aspect. The available material can give only an approximate assessment of last glaciation in the Gornaya Shoria mountain region. The massif of Mount Patyn (1630 m) is located in the extreme north-east of the Mountain Shoria on the watershed of the Tashtyk and the Mrassu rivers. At present, the massif is completely devoid of modern glaciation. Early summer snowfields appear on the leeward slopes of the eastern, southern and northern macroslopes. The moraine deposits and the configuration of the relief forms have proved mountain-valley glaciation in the Late Pleistocene. The article also touches upon the issue of the origin of the so-called «megaliths» of the massif of Pustag mountain.

The Mammoth and Mammoth Hunting in North-East Siberia

1926 ◽  
Vol 68 (4) ◽  
pp. 351 ◽  
Author(s):  
R. N. R. B. ◽  
B. Digby
Keyword(s):  
East Siberia ◽  
North East

CLIMATE@COA project: Climate and human adaptation during the Last Glacial Period in the Côa Valley region (Portugal)

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Luca Dimuccio ◽  
Thierry Aubry ◽  
Lúcio Cunha ◽  
Nelson Rodrigues
Keyword(s):  
Late Pleistocene ◽  
Interdisciplinary Approach ◽  
Evolutionary Model ◽  
Depositional Environments ◽  
Glacial Period ◽  
Upper Palaeolithic ◽  
Last Glacial Period ◽  
Last Glacial ◽  
North East ◽  
The Last Glacial

<p>In Portugal, climate fluctuations of Late Pleistocene are well-known from marine record on the western Iberian continental margin, particularly of Marine Isotope Stages 4, 3 and 2, and they include various events of secular abrupt climate changes. During cooling phases the Heinrich Events (HE) occurred, corresponding to episodes of massive ice-discharges from Northern Hemisphere ice sheets. Furthermore, several climate phases with relatively warmer conditions, known as Dansgaard-Oeschger (D-O) cycles, characterized by an abrupt warming (D-O event) followed by a more gradual cooling, took place in-between HE. This pronounced climate instability that characterizes the Last Glacial Period between ca. 80-12 ka is recorded in a variety of marine and terrestrial archives worldwide. It had a recognized impact on the bioclimatic zones and, possibly, on the Neanderthal and Anatomically Modern Human (AMH) settlements of Iberia.</p><p>Based mainly on the study of geoarchaeological records preserved in caves and rock-shelters of Iberia, a correlation framework with climate shifts has been proposed to explain the observed discontinuities between sequences containing late Middle and early Upper Palaeolithic remains. Moreover, a climate driven model has been advanced to explain the chronological differences between northern and southern Pyrenean data by a later dispersion of AMH and the persistence of last Neanderthals in Southern Iberia, which were interpreted as a direct impact of HE4 (40-38 ka) in the distribution of large ungulate populations.</p><p>Despite all these data, the exact impact of HE on terrestrial systems, the evaluation of the latitudinal differentiation of their impact and time-gap, as well as the correlation between periods of relative stabilization/soil formation and the D-O events remain to be clearly established. In addition, the whole framework relating to the Middle-to-Upper Palaeolithic transition has been excessively dependent on karst archives and it should be investigated in other geomorphological settings - among these the fluvial and Iberian plateau (“Meseta”), both present in the Côa Valley region (Douro Basin, north-east of Portugal). Alluvial and colluvial deposits preserved in the Côa Valley (e.g. at the Cardina-Salto do Boi, Quinta da Barca Sul, Penascosa, Fariseu, Olga de Ervamoira sites) have demonstrated to be a valuable record of information about Late Pleistocene sedimentary processes, depositional environments, and hunter-gatherer’s behaviour at local and regional scales.</p><p>In this context, the CLIMATE@COA project (COA/CAC/0031/2019), funded by the Fundação para a Ciência e Tecnologia (FCT), proposes an integrated multi/interdisciplinary approach based on the stratigraphical, sedimentological, geochemical, geomorphological, geoarchaeological, and geochronological analyses of terrestrial record (natural and cultural) preserved in the Côa Valley and surrounding plateau areas, with the aim to develop an evolutionary model for the region and to deduce the environmental forcing factors for such evolution - namely climate and ecosystem changes. In addition, the project’s data will allow to define better the chronology of the transition between Neanderthal and AMH and to infer on land use and social organization in its environmental context.</p>

scholarly journals Evolutionary history and palaeoecology of brown bear in North-East Siberia re-examined using ancient DNA and stable isotopes from skeletal remains

2019 ◽  
Vol 9 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Alba Rey-Iglesia ◽  
Ana García-Vázquez ◽  
Eve C. Treadaway ◽  
Johannes van der Plicht ◽  
Gennady F. Baryshnikov ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Stable Isotopes ◽  
Ancient Dna ◽  
Evolutionary History ◽  
Brown Bear ◽  
Skeletal Remains ◽  
East Siberia ◽  
North East

Genetic and archaeological evidence for a former breeding population of Aleutian Cackling Goose (Branta hutchinsii leucopareia) on Adak Island, central Aleutians, Alaska

2011 ◽  
Vol 89 (8) ◽  
pp. 732-743 ◽  
Author(s):  
B.J. Wilson ◽  
S.J. Crockford ◽  
J.W. Johnson ◽  
R.S. Malhi ◽  
B.M. Kemp
Keyword(s):  
Mitochondrial Genome ◽  
Control Region ◽  
Dna Sequences ◽  
Archaeological Site ◽  
Breeding Population ◽  
Cytb Gene ◽  
Breeding Ground ◽  
Before Present ◽  
European Contact ◽  
The Past

Many well-preserved bones of medium-sized goose have been recovered from the Zeto Point archaeological site (ADK-011) on Adak Island in the central Aleutians, Alaska, that date to ca. 170–415 years before present based on conventional radiometric dates of the deposits. This prehistoric sample includes remains of adults and unfledged goslings that defied confident identification based on osteological criteria. While the presence of newborns indicates that Adak was a breeding ground, which species was doing the nesting remained uncertain. Of the five species of medium-sized goose (order Anseriformes, family Anatidae) known or presumed to visit Adak Island, three are rarely sighted. The only common visitor is the Emperor Goose ( Chen canagica (Sevastianov, 1802)). The Aleutian Cackling Goose ( Branta hutchinsii leucopareia (Brandt, 1836)) breeds elsewhere in the Aleutians but does not currently breed on Adak Island and there are no records of it nesting there in the past. Here DNA sequences from portions of the cytochrome b (cytb) gene and the control region (CR) of the mitochondrial genome were recovered from 28 of 29 Adak prehistoric goose remains. All adult specimens identified to species were either C. canagica or B. h. leuopareia, but all specifically identified juvenile specimens were B. h. leuopareia. The results demonstrate that Adak Island was a breeding ground of the Aleutian Cackling Goose prior to European contact.

scholarly journals Molecular characterization and genetic diversity of four undescribed novel oleaginous Mortierella alpina strains from Libya

F1000Research ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 10 ◽  
pp. 895
Author(s):  
Fuzia Elfituri Muftah Eltariki ◽  
Kartikeya Tiwari ◽  
Mohammed Abdelfatah Alhoot
Keyword(s):  
Genetic Diversity ◽  
Single Cell ◽  
Dna Sequences ◽  
Research Study ◽  
Soil Samples ◽  
Mortierella Alpina ◽  
Morphological Identification ◽  
Single Cell Oil ◽  
North East ◽  
Fungal Isolates

Background: A large number of undiscovered fungal species still exist on earth, which can be useful for bioprospecting, particularly for single cell oil (SCO) production. Mortierella is one of the significant genera in this field and contains about hundred species. Moreover, M. alpina is the main single cell oil producer at commercial scale under this genus. Methods: Soil samples from four unique locations of North-East Libya were collected for the isolation of oleaginous Mortierella alpina strains by a serial dilution method. Morphological identification was carried out using light microscopy (Olympus, Japan) and genetic diversity of the isolated Mortierella alpina strains was assessed using conserved internal transcribed spacer (ITS) gene sequences available on the NCBI GenBank database for the confirmation of novelty. The nucleotide sequences reported in this study have been deposited at GenBank (accession no. MZ298831:MZ298835). The MultAlin program was used to align the sequences of closely related strains. The DNA sequences were analyzed for phylogenetic relationships by molecular evolutionary genetic analysis using MEGA X software consisting of Clustal_X v.2.1 for multiple sequence alignment. The neighbour-joining tree was constructed using the Kimura 2-parameter substitution model. Results: The present research study confirms four oleaginous fungal isolates from Libyan soil. These isolates (barcoded as MSU-101, MSU-201, MSU-401 and MSU-501) were discovered and reported for the first time from diverse soil samples of district Aljabal Al-Akhdar in North-East Libya and fall in the class: Zygomycetes; order: Mortierellales. Conclusions: Four oleaginous fungal isolates barcoded as MSU-101, MSU-201, MSU-401 and MSU-501 were identified and confirmed by morphological and molecular analysis. These fungal isolates showed highest similarity with Mortierella alpina species and can be potentialistic single cell oil producers. Thus, the present research study provides insight to the unseen fungal diversity and contributes to more comprehensive Mortierella alpina reference collections worldwide.

scholarly journals Historical biogeography of the leopard (Panthera pardus) and its extinct Eurasian populations

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Johanna L.A. Paijmans ◽  
Axel Barlow ◽  
Daniel W. Förster ◽  
Kirstin Henneberger ◽  
Matthias Meyer ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Late Pleistocene ◽  
Dna Sequences ◽  
Sister Group ◽  
Historical Biogeography ◽  
Early Pleistocene ◽  
Middle Pleistocene ◽  
Recent Common Ancestor ◽  
Panthera Pardus ◽  
Phylogenetic Placement ◽  
Out Of Africa

AbstractBackgroundResolving the historical biogeography of the leopard(Panthera pardus)is a complex issue, because patterns inferred from fossils and from molecular data lack congruence. Fossil evidence supports an African origin, and suggests that leopards were already present in Eurasia during the Early Pleistocene. Analysis of DNA sequences however, suggests a more recent, Middle Pleistocene shared ancestry of Asian and African leopards. These contrasting patterns led researchers to propose a two-stage hypothesis of leopard dispersal out of Africa: an initial Early Pleistocene colonisation of Asia and a subsequent replacement by a second colonisation wave during the Middle Pleistocene. The status of Late Pleistocene European leopards within this scenario is unclear: were these populations remnants of the first dispersal, or do the last surviving European leopards share more recent ancestry with their African counterparts?ResultsIn this study, we generate and analyse mitogenome sequences from historical samples that span the entire modern leopard distribution, as well as from Late Pleistocene remains. We find a deep bifurcation between African and Eurasian mitochondrial lineages (∼710 Ka), with the European ancient samples as sister to all Asian lineages (∼483 Ka). The modern and historical mainland Asian lineages share a relatively recent common ancestor (∼122 Ka), and we find one Javan sample nested within these.ConclusionsThe phylogenetic placement of the ancient European leopard as sister group to Asian leopards suggests that these populations originate from the same out-of-Africa dispersal which founded the Asian lineages. The coalescence time found for the mitochondrial lineages aligns well with the earliest undisputed fossils in Eurasia, and thus encourages a re-evaluation of the identification of the much older putative leopard fossils from the region. The relatively recent ancestry of all mainland Asian leopard lineages suggests that these populations underwent a severe population bottleneck during the Pleistocene. Finally, although only based on a single sample, the unexpected phylogenetic placement of the Javan leopard could be interpreted as evidence for exchange of mitochondrial lineages between Java and mainland Asia, calling for further investigation into the evolutionary history of this subspecies.

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