Research Reveals 10,000 Year-Old DNA Genetic Makeup Of Primitive Domesticated Goats

A team of researchers has discovered the genetic inclinations of world first goat herds. The new discovery incorporated from DNA extracted from the fossils of 32 goats that have perished over 10,000 years would help to give insights on how the first animal husbandry methods gave a leeway to the evolutions of the animals.

The remains of the goats, which were taken from Zagros Mountain In western Iran, a geographical area famed for an archaeological configuration of dead goats. One of the sites, Ganj Dareh had the bones of the animals showing that the male goats were intentionally slaughtered after they have come of a certain age while the female goats were allowed to grow older to an advanced age, indicative of the fact that early goat-keepers kept more female goats for breeding, unlike the male goats, aligning to the goat herders practices in the area of recent.

The research further highlighted that the synergy between the herders and the goats, which was obvious in the foundation of the settlement having cloven goat hooves imprints. It showed the goats having the semblance of a wild bezoar, having similar horn shape and expanded body size.

According to Dr. Kelvin, who is a research fellow in Trinity School of Genetics and Microbiology and incidentally, the first author of the paper, the “study shows how archaeology and genetics can address highly important questions by building off ideas and results from both fields. Our genetic results point to the Zagros region as being a major source of the ancestry of domestic goats and that herded, morphologically wild goats were genetically on the path to domestication by about 10,200 years ago.”

There is also a link to modern goats with the genetic analysis allowing the researchers to know that the ancient goats fell off at the early step of the domestic goat lineage, showing that there is a close relation to the animals first domesticated.

It was however surprising to discover that a small percentage of the goats among the listed 32 who had their genomes appearing like that of the bezoar ibex. This alludes to the suggestion that the early herders of goats were constantly hunting goats from wild herds.

In the words of Dr. Daly:

“This first livestock keeping shaped the goats’ genomes. There were signs of reduced Y chromosome diversity — fewer males were allowed to breed, leading to an increased tendency of relatives mating. Surprisingly, the Zagros goat appeared to not have undergone a population bottleneck often associated with domestication and lacked strong signals of selection found in later domestic goats.”

Dan Bradley, Professor of Population Genetics at Trinity, opined:

“Ancient DNA continues to allow us to plumb the depths of ancient prehistory and examine the origins of the world’s first livestock herds. Over 10,000 years ago, early animal farmers were practicing husbandry with a genetic legacy that continues today.”

The Research Funding was done by the European Research Council

N:b — The international collaboration of researchers behind the study included individuals from Trinity College Dublin, the Smithsonian Institution, the University of Copenhagen, the Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS) and Muséum National d’Histoire Naturelle (MNHN) of France, and the National Museum of Iran.

Reference: 7 June 2021, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
DOI: 10.1073/pnas.2100901118