As more elongated skulls come to light from various cultures and time periods, it is worth examining the differences between artificially deformed skulls and genetically dolichocephalic skulls.
The Oxus Civilisation (or Bactrio-Margian Archaeological Complex BMAC) was the main archaeological culture of the Bronze Age in Southern Central Asia. Paleogenetic analyses were previously conducted mainly on samples from the eastern part of BMAC. The population associated with BMAC descends from local Chalcolithic populations, with some outliers of steppe or South-Asian descent. Here, we present new genome-wide data for one individual from Ulug-depe (Turkmenistan), one of the main BMAC sites, located at the southwestern edge of the BMAC. We demonstrate that this individual genetically belongs to the BMAC cluster. Using this genome, we confirm that modern Indo-Iranian speaking populations from Central Asia derive their ancestry from BMAC populations, with gene flow from the western steppe and the Altai steppe being higher among Tajiks than among Yagnobis.
Domestication of goats in Iran was earlier than thought haaretz.com - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from haaretz.com Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.
Collaboration between Western and Iranian researchers on the the world's oldest livestock genomes helps pinpoint when humans first tamed goats and otherwise sparked the Neolithic Revolution.