Wednesday, May 11, 2016

Camels Originally Domesticated in Southern Arabia


Burger and her team succeeded in answering this question. The group of researchers analysed up to 7,000-year-old DNA from bones of wild and early-domesticated dromedaries and compared the samples with the genetic profiles of modern dromedary populations from around the world. For the first time, it was possible to identify the Southeast Arabian Peninsula as the region of first domestication. "Our results appear to confirm that the first domestication of wild dromedaries occurred on the southeast coast. This was followed by repeated breeding of wild dromedaries with the early-domesticated populations," Burger explains. The wild ancestor of today's dromedary had a geographically limited range and went extinct around 2,000 years after the first domestication.

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