NeoGenHeritage · Neotithic transition in the Iberian Peninsula: reviewing an old question from new technological and computational genome wide approaches

The research goal of this proposal revolves around a widely debatedtopic in archaeology, anthropology and population genetics: thedynamics of the spread of farming into Europe, or Neolithictransition. For a long time, this key event that was to define modernEuropeans has fuelled a dichotomic research debate. In short, did theNeolithic spread into Europe as the result of cultural or demographicdiffusion? While many approaches can be attempted, in the last fewyears, ancient DNA (aDNA) studies have strongly contributed toshedding light on this topic, through the recovery and analysis of anincreasing number of mitochondrial and nuclear genomes fromprehistorical human samples. Far from closing the debate, thesepalaeogenomes are revealing a more complicated scenario, where thetimes, paths and genetic legacy of the Neolithic diffusion seem tohave been different in different geographic areas. Furthermore, as thegenomic data increase, the aDNA field is soon facing the challenge ofevolving from a research area largely based on technical developmentfor the recovery of short DNA fragments, to the analysis of largerdatasets (ultimately, whole genome data) in the context of humanpopulation genetics.I therefore propose an interdisciplinary project aimed to increase ourknowledge on the Neolithic transition by generating, for thefirst time, genome data from ancient human remains from the IberianPeninsula at the times of the Neolithic transition. Having been thelast region of Europe reached by the Neolithic diffusion, the IP is acrucial area for understanding the relative role of migration and cultural changes. By combiningmodern technologies for the recovery of ancient genomes,with state-of-the-art statistical data analyses in the context ofhuman population genetics, this project will contribute to thedevelopment of practical and theoretical approaches to make the mostof aDNA as a powerful research tool in the fields of archaeology andantropology.