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Updated: Oct 6, 2026

Primer Extension Capture: Targeted Sequence Retrieval from Heavily Degraded DNA Sources
Published on: September 3, 2009
Absence of regional affinities of Neandertal DNA with living humans does not reject multiregional evolution
1Department of Anthropology, State University of New York College at Oneonta, Oneonta, New York 13820, USA. relethjh@oneonta.edu
Abstract:
The recent extraction of mitochondrial DNA sequences from three European Neandertal fossils has led many to the conclusion that ancient DNA analysis supports the African replacement model of modern human origins and rejects models of multiregional evolution that propose some Neandertal ancestry in living humans. This conclusion is based, in part, on the lack of regional affinity of Neandertal DNA to that from living Europeans. Consideration of migration matrix models shows that this conclusion is premature, since under a model of interregional gene flow we expect to see similar levels of Neandertal ancestry in all contemporary regions, and living Europeans should not necessarily show closer affinity. The absence of regional affinity in Neandertal DNA does not distinguish between replacement and multiregional models.
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