Dataset Information

Expansion of the known distribution of Asiatic mouflon (Ovis orientalis) in the Late Pleistocene of the Southern Levant.

ABSTRACT: Wild sheep (Ovis orientalis) bones recovered from the Natufian site of Shubayqa 1 demonstrate a wider distribution of mouflon in the Late Pleistocene of the Southern Levant than previously known. Early Epipalaeolithic sites are common in the limestone steppe region of eastern Jordan but have yielded only a handful of caprine bones that cannot be identified to species level and few faunal remains from excavated Late Epipalaeolithic sites have been reported. Analysis of animal bone from Shubayqa 1 suggests a significant population of wild sheep could be found concentrated in the basalt desert environment of eastern Jordan during the Late Pleistocene, especially where higher rainfall over the Jebel Druze provided more water. A population of wild sheep was still present in the Pre-Pottery Neolithic A when the nearby site of Shubayqa 6 was occupied. Hunting of diverse, locally available resources including wild sheep at the end of the Pleistocene illustrates the flexible and adaptive exploitation strategies that hunter-forager groups engaged in. This provides further evidence to the increasing body of data showing the creative and opportunistic approach of terminal Pleistocene groups allowing continued occupation even in more marginal environments in a period of environmental change.

SUBMITTER: Yeomans L

PROVIDER: S-EPMC5579105 | biostudies-literature | 2017 Aug

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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Expansion of the known distribution of Asiatic mouflon (<i>Ovis orientalis</i>) in the Late Pleistocene of the Southern Levant.

Yeomans Lisa L Martin Louise L Richter Tobias T

Royal Society open science 20170823 8

Wild sheep (<i>Ovis orientalis</i>) bones recovered from the Natufian site of Shubayqa 1 demonstrate a wider distribution of mouflon in the Late Pleistocene of the Southern Levant than previously known. Early Epipalaeolithic sites are common in the limestone steppe region of eastern Jordan but have yielded only a handful of caprine bones that cannot be identified to species level and few faunal remains from excavated Late Epipalaeolithic sites have been reported. Analysis of animal bone from Shu ...[more]

PMID: 28878989

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Project description:The gut microbiota is a complex and essential system organ that plays an integrative role in balancing key vital functions in the host. Knowledge of the impact of altitude on the gut microbiota of European mouflon (Ovis orientalis musimon) and blue sheep (Pseudois nayaur) is currently limited. In this study, we compared the characteristics of gut microbiota in 5 mouflon at low altitude (K group), 4 mouflon at high altitude (L group), 4 blue sheep at low altitude (M group), and 4 blue sheep at high altitude (N group). The V3-V4 region of the 16S rRNA gene was analyzed using high-throughput sequencing. Analyses based on the operational taxonomic units showed significant changes in the gut microbial communities between groups at different altitudes. At the phylum level, groups at the high altitudes had a higher relative abundance of Firmicutes and a lower relative abundance of Bacteroidetes than those at the low altitudes. A higher Firmicutes:Bacteroidetes ratio is beneficial to animals in terms of the gut microbiota-mediated energy harvest. The relative abundance of Proteobacteria was significantly higher in the gut microbiota of mouflon sheep at high altitudes. At the genus level, the Bacteroides:Prevotella ratio was significantly higher in the low-altitude group (than the high-altitude group) of mouflon sheep and the ratio was significantly higher in the high-altitude group (than the low-altitude group) in blue sheep. In addition, the Ruminococcaceae_UCG-005 related to cellulose and starch digestion was the predominant genus in blue sheep and the relative abundance of the genus was significant higher in the high-altitude group than the low-altitude group of blue sheep (P < 0.01). In conclusion, our results suggested that the gut microbiota of high-altitude groups of sheep had stronger abilities related to energy metabolism and the decomposition of substances, e.g., fiber and cellulose, and that such abilities are associated with high-altitude adaptation.

Project description:Sheep are thought to have been one of the first livestock to be domesticated in the Near East, thus playing an important role in human history. The current whole mitochondrial genome phylogeny for the genus Ovis is based on: the five main domestic haplogroups occurring among sheep (O. aries), along with molecular data from two wild European mouflons, three urials, and one argali. With the aim to shed some further light on the phylogenetic relationship within this genus, the first complete mitochondrial genome sequence of a Cypriot mouflon (O. gmelini ophion) is here reported. Phylogenetic analyses were performed using a dataset of whole Ovis mitogenomes as well as D-loop sequences. The concatenated sequence of 28 mitochondrial genes of one Cypriot mouflon, and the D-loop sequence of three Cypriot mouflons were compared to sequences obtained from samples representatives of the five domestic sheep haplogroups along with samples of the extant wild and feral sheep. The sample included also individuals from the Mediterranean islands of Sardinia and Corsica hosting remnants of the first wave of domestication that likely went then back to feral life. The divergence time between branches in the phylogenetic tree has been calculated using seven different calibration points by means of Bayesian and Maximum Likelihood inferences. Results suggest that urial (O. vignei) and argali (O. ammon) diverged from domestic sheep about 0.89 and 1.11 million years ago (MYA), respectively; and dates the earliest radiation of domestic sheep common ancestor at around 0.3 MYA. Additionally, our data suggest that the rise of the modern sheep haplogroups happened in the span of time between six and 32 thousand years ago (KYA). A close phylogenetic relationship between the Cypriot and the Anatolian mouflon carrying the X haplotype was detected. The genetic distance between this group and the other ovine haplogroups supports the hypothesis that it may be a new haplogroup never described before. Furthermore, the updated phylogenetic tree presented in this study determines a finer classification of ovine species and may help to classify more accurately new mitogenomes within the established haplogroups so far identified.

Dataset Information

Expansion of the known distribution of Asiatic mouflon (Ovis orientalis) in the Late Pleistocene of the Southern Levant.

Publications

Expansion of the known distribution of Asiatic mouflon (<i>Ovis orientalis</i>) in the Late Pleistocene of the Southern Levant.

Similar Datasets

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