ArticleProceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America2014
Prehistoric genomes reveal the genetic foundation and cost of horse domestication.
Article in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 2014. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 154 papers.
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Who cites it
154 citing papers in PubMed, 344 citations in OpenAlex.
- Comprehensive transcriptomics comparison reveals switch of gene networks in the brain during silkworm domestication.Insect science · 2026Article
- Integrative Advances in Equine Genomics From Reference Assemblies to Evolutionary History and Key Traits.Evolutionary applications · 2026Review
- Increased Genetic Load in Breed Chickens and Reduced Coding Content in Long ROH.Genome biology and evolution · 2026Article
- Whole-Genome Resequencing of the VGSC Reveals the Evolutionary Mechanism of Pesticide Resistance inInternational journal of molecular sciences · 2026Article
- Mitochondrial DNA reveals high maternal diversity within a weak breed structure in native Kazakhstani horses.Frontiers in genetics · 2026Article
- Domestication is adaptive evolution in response to human use.Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · 2025Article
- The Evolutionary Dynamics of Genetic Mutational Load Throughout Tomato Domestication History.Molecular ecology · 2025Article
- That's So Last Season: Unraveling the Genomic Consequences of Fur Farming in Arctic Foxes (Vulpes lagopus).Molecular ecology · 2025Article
- Mitochondrial genomes of Middle Pleistocene horses from the open-air site complex of Schöningen.Nature ecology & evolution · 2025Article
- Coexisting With Humans: Genomic and Behavioral Consequences in a Small and Isolated Bear Population.Molecular biology and evolution · 2025Article
- Inferring Domestic Goat Demographic History Through Ancient Genome Imputation.Genome biology and evolution · 2025Article
- Tracking domestication signals across populations of North American raccoons (Procyon lotor) via citizen science-driven image repositories.Frontiers in zoology · 2025Article
- A reanalysis of population dynamics in the Casas Grandes region of Northern Mexico using mitochondrial DNA.Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · 2025Article
- Late Iron Age and Roman equine breeding north of the Alps: Genetic insights and cultural implications.iScience · 2025Article
- Uncovering Genetic Diversity and Adaptive Candidate Genes in the Mugalzhar Horse Breed Using Whole-Genome Sequencing Data.Animals : an open access journal from MDPI · 2025Article
- High-quality, haplotype-resolved reference genomes of the Dutch warmblood horse and Friesian horse using trio binning.BMC genomics · 2025Article
- The genomic history of Iberian horses since the last Ice Age.Nature communications · 2025Article
- Analysis of ROH Characteristics Across Generations in Grassland-Thoroughbred Horses and Identification of Loci Associated with Athletic Traits.Animals : an open access journal from MDPI · 2025Article
- Ancient DNA analysis of elite nomadic warrior from Chinge-Tey I funerary commemorative complex in the "Valley of the Kings", Tuva.BMC genomics · 2025Article
- Unraveling the genetic and physiological potential of donkeys: insights from genomics, proteomics, and metabolomics approaches.Mammalian genome : official journal of the International Mammalian Genome Society · 2025Review
94 more citing papers are in PubMed but not listed here.
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Authors and funding
35 authors at 14 institutions in 9 countries.
Funding
Abstract
The domestication of the horse ∼ 5.5 kya and the emergence of mounted riding, chariotry, and cavalry dramatically transformed human civilization. However, the genetics underlying horse domestication are difficult to reconstruct, given the near extinction of wild horses. We therefore sequenced two ancient horse genomes from Taymyr, Russia (at 7.4- and 24.3-fold coverage), both predating the earliest archeological evidence of domestication. We compared these genomes with genomes of domesticated horses and the wild Przewalski's horse and found genetic structure within Eurasia in the Late Pleistocene, with the ancient population contributing significantly to the genetic variation of domesticated breeds. We furthermore identified a conservative set of 125 potential domestication targets using four complementary scans for genes that have undergone positive selection. One group of genes is involved in muscular and limb development, articular junctions, and the cardiac system, and may represent physiological adaptations to human utilization. A second group consists of genes with cognitive functions, including social behavior, learning capabilities, fear response, and agreeableness, which may have been key for taming horses. We also found that domestication is associated with inbreeding and an excess of deleterious mutations. This genetic load is in line with the "cost of domestication" hypothesis also reported for rice, tomatoes, and dogs, and it is generally attributed to the relaxation of purifying selection resulting from the strong demographic bottlenecks accompanying domestication. Our work demonstrates the power of ancient genomes to reconstruct the complex genetic changes that transformed wild animals into their domesticated forms, and the population context in which this process took place.
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