https://thenewkokoro.com/2021/05/16/minute-traces-of-dna-discovered-in-cave-dust-may-reveal-the-secret-life-of-neanderthals/

Scientists have discovered significant changes in Europe’s Neanderthal populations based on traces of blood and excrement left behind in a Spanish cave 100,000 years ago.
The discovery represents the first significant demonstration of a powerful new technique that enables researchers to study DNA recovered from cave sediments. Such investigations do not necessitate the use of fossils or stone tools. Instead, minuscule traces of genetic material found in the dust of a cavern floor are used to uncover ancient secrets.

The power of cave dirt DNA analysis, as one researcher put it, is the scientific equivalent of “extracting gold dust from the air,” and it has raised hopes that it will transform our understanding of how our forefathers behaved.

Professor Chris Stringer of the Natural History Museum in London said, “The potential of this technology is fantastic.” “You don’t need a stone tool or a fossil bone to determine whether an ancient human lived or worked at a site. All you need is the DNA from their cave homes, which was left behind in the debris. This has far-reaching implications for a wide range of investigations.”

What ancient DNA tells us about humans and Neanderthals - The Verge

Future cave dirt DNA analyses could focus on the Denisovans, an enigmatic species of early humans who lived in east Asia tens of thousands of years ago. Scientists could learn how far the species spread before becoming extinct by studying sediments in caves and other locations in India, China, and other parts of Asia.

The technique could also help researchers learn more about Homo floresiensis, the small-bodied “Hobbit” people who lived in Indonesia more than 50,000 years ago but left only a scant collection of remains. Furthermore, it could be used to pinpoint the precise timing of modern humans’ exodus from Africa and arrival in Europe tens of millennia ago.

Current studies in each case have been hampered by a lack of hard evidence, an issue that does not affect cave dirt DNA analysis. The technique was developed four years ago by scientists at Germany’s Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, and its utility was demonstrated in a “proof of concept” paper published in the journal Science in 2017. Scientists demonstrated that they could identify Neanderthal DNA among the other scraps of genetic material found in caves.

Scientists say our languages might preserve Neanderthal talk

The researchers have now advanced the technology by determining the exact genetic identity of Neanderthals who once lived in the cave Galera de las Estatuas – or the Gallery of Statues – in northern Spain. The findings were once again published in Science.

“Galera de las Estatuas is a well-studied cave with clear evidence of Neanderthals living there for tens of thousands of years,” said Max Planck researcher Benjamin Vernot, who led the investigation. “We don’t believe they buried their dead there, but we believe they butchered meat there. They would occasionally cut themselves and bleed on the cave floor. Similarly, their babies would have excreted there, leaving their DNA behind.”

The most important aspect of Galera de las Estatuas is that it has been meticulously studied by palaeontologists and archaeologists, so that each layer of cave sediment has been precisely analysed and dated. “That means we can put an exact date on the DNA samples we found in each layer,” Vernot explained. This resulted in an unexpected discovery. The researchers discovered that about 100,000 years ago, the population that had been living in the cave for millennia was replaced by a completely different group of Neanderthals.

Why Did The Neanderthals Go Extinct? | OpenMind

“It was as if a modern European population had been replaced by East Asians,” Vernot said. “However, we don’t know whether this was a violent or a relatively slow process.”
Vernot, on the other hand, pointed out that around this time, the Earth experienced a significant change in climate as weather systems cooled. “It is possible that the first inhabitants were unable to tolerate or survive the cold in the area surrounding Galera de las Estatuas and died out or chose to leave. Later, as the weather improved, a new population – with a different genetic signature – arrived,” Vernot explained.
According to Stringer, this demonstrates the power of cave dirt DNA analysis.

“Getting a bigger picture of how past populations of ancient humans, such as the Neanderthals, moved around has been difficult to assess based on a few bits of bone and the odd stone tool,” he said. “However, studying the DNA they left behind opens up a whole new window into our prehistory.”
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The (Not so) Secret Life of our Inner Neanderthal - Science in the News

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https://thenewkokoro.com/2021/05/16/minute-traces-of-dna-discovered-in-cave-dust-may-reveal-the-secret-life-of-neanderthals/