title: The origin of European cattle: evidence from modern and ancient DNA.
abstract: Cattle domestication from wild aurochsen was among the most important innovations during the Neolithic agricultural revolution. The available genetic and archaeological evidence points to at least two major sites of domestication in India and in the Near East, where zebu and the taurine breeds would have emerged independently. Under this hypothesis, all present-day European breeds would be descended from cattle domesticated in the Near East and subsequently spread during the diffusion of herding and farming lifestyles. We present here previously undescribed genetic evidence in contrast with this view, based on mtDNA sequences from five Italian aurochsen dated between 7,000 and 17,000 years B.P. and >1,000 modern cattle from 51 breeds. Our data are compatible with local domestication events in Europe and support at least some levels of introgression from the aurochs in Italy. The distribution of genetic variation in modern cattle suggest also that different south European breeds were affected by introductions from northern Africa. If so, the European cattle may represent a more variable and valuable genetic resource than previously realized, and previous simple hypotheses regarding the domestication process and the diffusion of selected breeds should be revised.
authors.affiliation: Centro de Investigação em Biodiversidade e Recursos Genéticos (CIBIO-UP) and Secção Autónoma de Engenharia de Ciências Agrárias, Universidade do Porto, 4485-661 Vairão, Portugal.
authors.forename: Albano
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Beja-Pereira
authors.forename: David
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Caramelli
authors.forename: Carles
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Lalueza-Fox
authors.forename: Cristiano
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Vernesi
authors.forename: Nuno
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Ferrand
authors.forename: Antonella
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Casoli
authors.forename: Felix
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Goyache
authors.forename: Luis J
authors.initials: LJ
authors.lastname: Royo
authors.forename: Serena
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Conti
authors.forename: Martina
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Lari
authors.forename: Andrea
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Martini
authors.forename: Lahousine
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Ouragh
authors.forename: Ayed
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Magid
authors.forename: Abdulkarim
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Atash
authors.forename: Attila
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Zsolnai
authors.forename: Paolo
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Boscato
authors.forename: Costas
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Triantaphylidis
authors.forename: Konstantoula
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Ploumi
authors.forename: Luca
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Sineo
authors.forename: Francesco
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Mallegni
authors.forename: Pierre
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Taberlet
authors.forename: Georg
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Erhardt
authors.forename: Lourdes
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Sampietro
authors.forename: Jaume
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Bertranpetit
authors.forename: Guido
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Barbujani
authors.forename: Gordon
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Luikart
authors.forename: Giorgio
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Bertorelle
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D001483:Base Sequence; D001947:Breeding; D002417:Cattle; D004272:DNA, Mitochondrial / Q000032:analysis / Q000235:genetics*; D005060:Europe; D014644:Genetic Variation; D005828:Genetics, Population; D005843:Geography; D008969:Molecular Sequence Data; D017422:Sequence Analysis, DNA; D013045:Species Specificity
chemical_list: D004272:DNA, Mitochondrial