We are pleased to announce the collaboration of Lídia Colominas on an archaeozoological paper in the prestigious journal “Science”.
The paper, titled “The emergence and diversification of dog morphology” lead by Allowen Evin (Institute of Evolutionary Science-Montpellier) and Carly Ameen (University of Exeter) is the result of the collaborative effort of more than 40 researchers from different institutions worldwide. The research, which began in 2012, analysed 643 modern and archaeological canid skulls – including recognised breeds, street dogs, and wolves- spanning the last 50,000 years.
You can read all the details and download it for free here
ABSTRACT
Dogs exhibit an exceptional range of morphological diversity as a result of their long-term association with humans. Attempts to identify when dog morphological variation began to expand have been constrained by the limited number of Pleistocene specimens, the fragmentary nature of remains, and difficulties in distinguishing early dogs from wolves on the basis of skeletal morphology. In this study, we used three-dimensional geometric morphometrics to analyze the size and shape of 643 canid crania spanning the past 50,000 years. Our analyses show that a distinctive dog morphology first appeared at about 11,000 calibrated years before present, and substantial phenotypic diversity already existed in early Holocene dogs. Thus, this variation emerged many millennia before the intense human-mediated selection shaping modern dog breeds beginning in the 19th century.
The research was supported by funding from national and international agencies including the Natural Environment Research Council (UK), the Arts and Humanities Research Council (UK), the European Research Council, the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada, the Russian Academy of Sciences, and the Fyssen Foundation.
