Thread Rating:
  • 0 Vote(s) - 0 Average
  • 1
  • 2
  • 3
  • 4
  • 5

North America's 1st dogs disappeared, left behind sexually transmitted cancer

#1
C C Offline
https://www.sciencealert.com/first-dogs-...ase-legacy

http://www.gizmodo.co.uk/2018/07/america...ed-cancer/

EXCERPT: . . . Confirming earlier work, the researchers found these ancient American dogs have very little in common with modern dogs today, genetically speaking. And they also have no common ties with the North American wolf, suggesting they weren’t tamed from the local canine population the proto-Americans encountered. But these dogs did share more genetic similarities with breeds such as the Siberian Husky, though not as direct descendants. Instead, these dogs shared an ancestor with the husky.

[...] From their origins in Siberia, the dogs spread down through the continent with human settlements, becoming partially or even completely domesticated as the years ticked by. It's likely they looked somewhat similar to the wolves that preceded them by a few thousand years, also journeying across the land bridge formed by the Ice Age's lowered sea level. The 19th century American naturalist John James Audubon remarked, "The Indian dogs which I saw here so very closely resemble wild wolves, that I feel assured that if I was to meet with one of them in the woods, I should most assuredly kill it as such."

[...] Today these wolf-like dogs are no more. Their disappearance coincided with colonisation, their ultimate fate left to speculation. "This suggests something catastrophic must have happened, and it's likely associated with European colonisation," says Laurent Frantz from the University of Oxford. "But we just do not have the evidence to explain this sudden disappearance yet."

[...] While some American dogs might have been wiped out by epidemics or purposefully killed by Europeans, as indigenous people often were, there are likely other reasons for their demise. [...] The results seem to undercut the popular narrative that breeds such as chihuahuas are descended from ancient American dogs, since their mitochondrial DNA had less than 2 per cent in common with the ancient dogs in this study. Not every expert is convinced that’s the case, though.

[...] Less controversial is the researchers’ theory about the canine transmissible venereal tumour (CTVT), a sexually transmitted form of cancer that has spread globally. Because CTVTs (and all cancers) are essentially the mutated form of an animal’s DNA, it’s possible to trace back its genetic structure to the dog who first developed it. And the researchers found that this “CTVT founder” dog was closely related to pre-contact dogs, suggesting the disease had originated some 8,000 years ago...

MORE: https://www.sciencealert.com/first-dogs-...ase-legacy ... http://www.gizmodo.co.uk/2018/07/america...ed-cancer/
Reply


Possibly Related Threads…
Thread Author Replies Views Last Post
  Article Why ten billion snow crabs disappeared off the coast of Alaska C C 2 127 Oct 21, 2023 11:38 PM
Last Post: Zinjanthropos
  Article Oldest footprints in North America reinforced as dating up to 23,000 years old C C 1 87 Oct 10, 2023 04:25 PM
Last Post: C C
  Working to heal homelessness + Dogs are not hobos who assign reputations to humans C C 0 116 Aug 18, 2022 09:53 PM
Last Post: C C
  Are you washing your hands wrong? + 1st new cancer indicator in 30 years C C 0 248 May 23, 2017 02:02 AM
Last Post: C C
  Reading to Dogs May Improve Literacy C C 1 584 Mar 4, 2016 08:42 PM
Last Post: Magical Realist



Users browsing this thread: 1 Guest(s)