World’s oldest DNA reveals how mammoths evolved

An international team, including the Museum’s Prof Adrian Lister, has sequenced DNA recovered from mammoth remains that are up to 1.2 million years old. The analyses show that the Columbian mammoth that inhabited North America during the last ice age was a hybrid between the woolly mammoth and a previously unknown genetic lineage of mammoth. In addition, the study provides new insights into when and how fast mammoths became adapted to cold climate.

Around one million years ago there were no woolly mammoths, as they had not yet evolved. This was the time of their predecessor, the ancient steppe mammoth. Researchers have now managed to analyse the genomes from three ancient mammoths, using DNA recovered from mammoth teeth that had been buried for 0.7-1.2 million years in the Siberian permafrost.

This is the first time that DNA has been sequenced and authenticated from million-year-old specimens, predating the existence of humans and Neanderthals. Extracting the DNA from the samples was challenging. The scientists found that only minute amounts of DNA remained in the samples and that the DNA was degraded into very small fragments.

Prof Adrian Lister, Merit Researcher at the Natural History Museum and author on this study says, ‘Until now ancient DNA has rarely probed beyond a few tens of thousands of years, limiting what we can learn about the process of evolution.  With million-year-old DNA we extend beyond the date of origin of many iconic species like the mammoth, so we can track how species evolve and how their adaptations have arisen.’

The age of the specimens was determined using both geological data and the molecular clock. Both these types of analyses showed that two of the specimens are more than one million years old, whereas the third is roughly 700 thousand years old and represents one of the earliest known woolly mammoths.

Analyses of the genomes showed that the oldest specimen, which was approximately 1.2 million years old, belonged to a previously unknown genetic lineage of mammoth. The researchers refer to this as the Krestovka mammoth, based on the locality where it was found. The results show that the Krestovka mammoth diverged from other Siberian mammoths more than two million years ago.

Until now, all previous studies indicated that there was only one species of mammoth in Siberia at that point, the steppe mammoth, so the team were surprised to see that their DNA analyses now show that there were two different genetic lineages, referred to as the Adycha mammoth and the Krestovka mammoth.

The researchers also suggest that it was mammoths that belonged to the Krestovka lineage that colonised North America some 1.5 million years ago. In addition, the analyses show that the iconic Columbian mammoth that inhabited North America during the last ice age, was a hybrid. Roughly half of its genome came from the Krestovka lineage and the other half from the woolly mammoth.

The second million-year-old genome, from the Adycha mammoth, appears to have been ancestral to the woolly mammoth. The researchers could therefore compare its genome with the genome from one of the earliest known woolly mammoths that lived 0.7 million years ago, as well as with mammoth genomes that are only a few thousand years old. This made it possible to investigate how mammoths became adapted to a life in cold environments and to what extent these adaptations evolved during the speciation process.

The analyses showed that gene variants associated with life in the Arctic, such as hair growth, thermoregulation, fat deposits, cold tolerance and circadian rhythms, were already present in the million-year-old mammoth, long before the origin of the woolly mammoth. These results indicate that most adaptations in the mammoth lineage happened slowly and gradually over time.

Prof Lister concluded ‘This collaboration between palaeontologists and geneticists has been immensely rewarding. Earlier studies by myself and colleagues had suggested an origin of North American mammoths from Siberian steppe mammoths, based purely on their tooth morphology, but we could never have guessed that it was a genetic lineage that had separated off in Siberia a million years previously, nor that it hybridised with woolly mammoths well before the last ice age. We also saw the steppe mammoth’s teeth and skull as adapted to the arctic environment, and it is great to have this confirmed, with so much more detail, by the genetics’.

These findings are published in Nature.

ENDS

Notes for editors  

Natural History Museum Media contact: Tel: +44 (0)20 7942 5654/ (0)779 969 0151 Email: press@nhm.ac.uk

Press pack: Available here.

About the Natural History Museum 

The Natural History Museum is both a world-leading science research centre and the most visited natural history museum in Europe. With a vision of a future in which both people and the planet thrive, it is uniquely positioned to be a powerful champion for balancing humanity’s needs with those of the natural world.  

It is custodian of one of the world’s most important scientific collections comprising over 80 million specimens. The scale of this collection enables researchers from all over the world to document how species have and continue to respond to environmental changes - which is vital in helping predict what might happen in the future and informing future policies and plans to help the planet.  

The Museum’s 300 scientists continue to represent one of the largest groups in the world studying and enabling research into every aspect of the natural world. Their science is contributing critical data to help the global fight to save the future of the planet from the major threats of climate change and biodiversity loss through to finding solutions such as the sustainable extraction of natural resources. 

The Museum uses its enormous global reach and influence to meet its mission to create advocates for the planet - to inform, inspire and empower everyone to make a difference for nature. We welcome over five million visitors each year, our digital output reaches hundreds of thousands of people in over

200 countries each month and our touring exhibitions have been seen by around 30 million people in the last 10 years.