0000000000593998

AUTHOR

Mathias Stiller

Palaeolithic dogs and Pleistocene wolves revisited: a reply to Morey (2014)

This is a reply to the comments of Morey (2014) on our identification of Palaeolithic dogs from several European Palaeolithic sites. In his comments Morey (2014) presents some misrepresentations and misunderstandings that we remedy here. In contrast to what Morey (2014) propounds, our results suggest that the domestication of the wolf was a long process that started early in the Upper Palaeolithic and that since that time two sympatric canid morphotypes can be seen in Eurasian sites: Pleistocene wolves and Palaeolithic dogs. Contrary to Morey (2014), we are convinced that the study of this domestication process should be multidisciplinary.

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Melanoma Lesions Independently Acquire T-cell Resistance during Metastatic Latency

Abstract Melanoma often recurs after a latency period of several years, presenting a T cell–edited phenotype that reflects a role for CD8+ T cells in maintaining metastatic latency. Here, we report an investigation of a patient with multiple recurrent lesions, where poorly immunogenic melanoma phenotypes were found to evolve in the presence of autologous tumor antigen–specific CD8+ T cells. Melanoma cells from two of three late recurrent metastases, developing within a 6-year latency period, lacked HLA class I expression. CD8+ T cell–resistant, HLA class I–negative tumor cells became clinically apparent 1.5 and 6 years into stage IV disease. Genome profiling by SNP arrays revealed that HLA …

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Spatio-temporal dynamics of genetic variation in the Iberian lynx along its path to extinction reconstructed with ancient DNA

here is the tendency to assume that endangered species have been both genetically and demographically healthier in the past, so that any genetic erosion observed today was caused by their recent decline. The Iberian lynx (Lynx pardinus) suffered a dramatic and continuous decline during the 20th century, and now shows extremely low genome- and species-wide genetic diversity among other signs of genomic erosion. We analyze ancient (N = 10), historical (N = 245), and contemporary (N = 172) samples with microsatellite and mitogenome data to reconstruct the species' demography and investigate patterns of genetic variation across space and time. Iberian lynx populations transitioned from low but …

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Palaeolithic dogs and the early domestication of the wolf: a reply to the comments of Crockford and Kuzmin (2012)

This is a response to the comments of Crockford and Kuzmin (2012) on our identification of Palaeolithic dogs from different European Palaeolithic sites. In their comments Crockford and Kuzmin (2012) present some errors, misunderstandings and misrepresentations that we remedy here. In our opinion, the early wolf domestication must be regarded as an intimate relationship between humans and canids including the breeding of the latter by prehistoric people, resulting in the European Palaeolithic dogs.

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