0000000000937119
AUTHOR
Shameem Younuskunju
Holocene selection for variants associated with cognitive ability: Comparing ancient and modern genomes
ABSTRACTHuman populations living in Eurasia during the Holocene experienced considerable microevolutionary change. It has been predicted that the transition of Holocene populations into agrarianism and urbanization brought about culture-gene coevolution that favoured via directional selection genetic variants associated with higher general cognitive ability (GCA). To examine whether GCA might have risen during the Holocene, we compare a sample of 99 ancient Eurasian genomes (ranging from 4.56 to 1.21 kyr BP) with a sample of 503 modern European genomes, using three different cognitive polygenic scores. Significant differences favouring the modern genomes were found for all three polygenic s…
Holocene Selection for Variants Associated With General Cognitive Ability: Comparing Ancient and Modern Genomes
Human populations living during the Holocene underwent considerable microevolutionary change. It has been theorized that the transition of Holocene populations into agrarianism and urbanization brought about culture-gene co-evolution that favored via directional selection genetic variants associated with higher general cognitive ability (GCA). To examine whether GCA might have risen during the Holocene, we compare a sample of 99 ancient Eurasian genomes (ranging from 4.56 to 1.21 kyr BP) with a sample of 503 modern European genomes (Fst= 0.013), using three different cognitive polygenic scores (130 SNP, 9 SNP and 11 SNP). Significant differences favoring the modern genomes were found for al…
Deletion of beta-fructofuranosidase (invertase) genes is associated with sucrose content in Date Palm fruit
AbstractThe fruit of date palm trees are an important part of the diet for a large portion of the Middle East and North Africa. The fruit is consumed both fresh and dry and can be stored dry for extended periods of time. Date fruits vary significantly across hundreds of cultivars identified in the main regions of cultivation. Most dried date fruit are low in sucrose but high in glucose and fructose. However, high sucrose content is a distinctive feature of some date fruit and affects flavor as well as texture and water retention. To identify the genes controlling high sucrose content we analyzed date fruit metabolomics for association with genotype data from 121 date fruits. We found signif…
Novel subpopulations in date palm (Phoenix dactylifera) identified by population-wide organellar genome sequencing
Background The date palm is one of the oldest cultivated fruit trees. The tree can withstand high temperatures and low water and the fruit can be stored dry offering nutrition across the year. The first region of cultivation is believed to be near modern day Iraq, however, where and if the date palm was domesticated is still a topic of debate. Recent studies of chloroplast and genomic DNA revealed two major subpopulations of cultivars centered in both the Eastern range of date palm cultivation including Arabian Peninsula, Iraq and parts of South Asia, and the Western range, including North Africa. Results To better understand the origins of date palm cultivation we sequenced and analyzed ov…
Additional file 2: of Novel subpopulations in date palm (Phoenix dactylifera) identified by population-wide organellar genome sequencing
Mitochondrial and Chloroplast Haplotype SNP Positions. Table containing genotypes for all intra-date palm SNP positions in the Mitochondrial and Chloroplast haplotypes identified in this study. (XLSX 18 kb)
Additional file 1: of Novel subpopulations in date palm (Phoenix dactylifera) identified by population-wide organellar genome sequencing
Cultivar Information. Table containing information on date palm cultivars analyzed in this study. (XLSX 17 kb)
Additional file 3: of Novel subpopulations in date palm (Phoenix dactylifera) identified by population-wide organellar genome sequencing
Date Palm Genotypes. File containing all genotypes utilized in this analysis in vcf format. (VCF 3902 kb)