Tracking the origins of Yakutian horses and the genetic basis for their fast adaptation to subarctic environments

• DOI: 10.1073/pnas.1513696112
• Publication Date: 2015-11-24T03:19:00Z
• Authors: Pablo Librado; Clio Der Sarkissian; Luca Ermini; Mikkel Schubert; Hákon Jónsson; Anders Albrechtsen; Matteo Fumagalli; Melinda A. Yang; Cristina Gamba; Andaine Seguin-Or...; Cecilie D. Mortensen; Bent Petersen; Cindi A. Hoover; Belen Lorente-Galdos; Artem Nedoluzhko; Eugenia Boulygina; Svetlana Tsygankova; Markus Neuditschko; Vidhya Jagannathan; Catherine Thèves; Ahmed H. Alfarhan; Saleh A. Alquraishi; Khaled A. S. Al-R...; Thomas Sicheritz-...; Ruslan Popov; Semyon Grigoriev; Anatoly N. Alekseev; Edward M. Rubin; Molly McCue; Stefan Rieder; Tosso Leeb; Alexei Tikhonov; Eric Crubézy; Montgomery Slatkin; Tomas Marques-Bonet; Rasmus Nielsen; Eske Willerslev; Juha Kantanen; Egor Prokhortchouk; Ludovic Orlando
• Keywords: Subarctic climate

Significance Yakutia is among the coldest regions in Northern Hemisphere, showing ∼40% of its territory above Arctic Circle. Native horses are particularly adapted to this environment, with body sizes and thick winter coats minimizing heat loss. We sequenced complete genomes two ancient nine present-day Yakutian elucidate their evolutionary origins. find that contemporary population descends from domestic livestock, likely brought by early horse-riders who settled region a few centuries ago. The metabolic, anatomical, physiological adaptations these therefore emerged on very short time scales. show relative importance regulatory changes adaptive process identify genes independently selected cold-adapted human populations woolly mammoths.