Dogs have been man’s best friend for 33,000 years
The unbreakable bond between man and dog likely began in South East Asia 33,000 years ago when our ancestors began using grey wolves to hunt, according to DNA analysis.
Scientists examined the genetic make-up of wolves and dogs from China, Africa and Europe, to discover domesticated dogs evolved from the first grey wolves that joined humans on ancient scavenging missions.
The study shows the first domesticated dogs then migrated to Europe, rather than descending from domesticated European wolves 10,000 years ago as was previously been thought.
In a bid to solve the mystery, Professor Peter Savolainen led an international team that sequenced the genomes of 58 members of the dog family.
This included grey wolves, indigenous dogs from South East Asia and North East Asia, village dogs from Nigeria, and a collection of breeds from the rest of the world, such as the Afghan hound and Siberian husky.
Professor Savolainen, said this indicates ‘an ancient origin of domestic dogs in southern East Asia 33,000 years ago.’
The domestication of dogs is thought to have begun in South East Asia, 33,000 years ago.
This is when grey wolves are believed to have hunted alongside ancient humans.
Around 15,000 years ago, a subset of dog ancestors started to migrate towards the Middle East and Africa, reaching Europe approximately 10,000 years ago.
This may have been owing to environmental factors, such as the retreat of glaciers, which started approximately 19,000 years ago.
‘The mild population bottleneck in dogs suggests dog domestication may have been a long process that started from a group of wolves that became loosely associated and scavenged with humans, before experiencing waves of selection for phenotypes (mutations) that gradually favoured stronger bonding with humans, a process called self-domestication,’ Professor Savolainen explained.
So the history of dogs may involve three major stages – pre-domesticated scavengers, domesticated non-breed dogs with close human-dog interactions, and those bred by humans.
This dispersal is believed to have been associated with the movement of humans.
Source: Daily Mail
N.H.Khider