Ancient DNA: Methods, progress, and perspectives

The advent of the polymerase chain reaction as a standard molecular genetic technique and the demonstration that nucleic acids are routinely preserved in prehistoric material have led to a dramatic increase in molecular approaches to archaeological problems. These genetic approaches to long-standing problems in prehistory hold considerable promise to clarify issues of population origins, migrations, and settlement patterns, as well as ancestor/descendant relationships. The evolving methods for manipulating and analyzing ancient DNA (aDNA) are reviewed here, as are more recent applications of these methods to anthropologically relevant samples. In addition, new preliminary material is presented on mtDNA variation in Anasazi samples from the U.S. Southwest. The initial samples analyzed indicate similarity to contemporary populations of the Greater Southwest, as evidenced by the modest frequency of a 9bp deletion in Region V of the mtDNA molecule, and the possible absence of haplogroup D. © 1996 Wiley-Liss, Inc.