title: Genomic sequencing of Pleistocene cave bears.
abstract: Despite the greater information content of genomic DNA, ancient DNA studies have largely been limited to the amplification of mitochondrial sequences. Here we describe metagenomic libraries constructed with unamplified DNA extracted from skeletal remains of two 40,000-year-old extinct cave bears. Analysis of approximately 1 megabase of sequence from each library showed that despite significant microbial contamination, 5.8 and 1.1% of clones contained cave bear inserts, yielding 26,861 base pairs of cave bear genome sequence. Comparison of cave bear and modern bear sequences revealed the evolutionary relationship of these lineages. The metagenomic approach used here establishes the feasibility of ancient DNA genome sequencing programs.
authors.affiliation: United States Department of Energy Joint Genome Institute, Walnut Creek, CA 94598, USA.
authors.forename: James P
authors.initials: JP
authors.lastname: Noonan
authors.forename: Michael
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Hofreiter
authors.forename: Doug
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Smith
authors.forename: James R
authors.initials: JR
authors.lastname: Priest
authors.forename: Nadin
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Rohland
authors.forename: Gernot
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Rabeder
authors.forename: Johannes
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Krause
authors.forename: J Chris
authors.initials: JC
authors.lastname: Detter
authors.forename: Svante
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Pääbo
authors.forename: Edward M
authors.initials: EM
authors.lastname: Rubin
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D003001:Cloning, Molecular; D019295:Computational Biology; D004247:DNA / Q000235:genetics / Q000266:history; D004285:Dogs / Q000235:genetics; D016678:Genome; D015698:Genomic Library; D049690:History, Ancient; D008969:Molecular Sequence Data; D010802:Phylogeny; D016415:Sequence Alignment; D017422:Sequence Analysis, DNA; D001503:Ursidae / Q000235:genetics*
chemical_list: D004247:DNA