Sweet aDNA O'Mine: The Rise and Fall of Ice Sheets and the Arctic Peopling from Beringia

Summary

The peopling of the North American Arctic was made possible after the full retreat of the Laurentide ice sheet. The archaeological record supports multiple migrations beginning approximately 6,000 years BP, thousands of years after the initial colonization of the Americas. Modern Iñupiat/Inuit peoples are the descendants of a recent (~800 ybp) and rapid (<200 years) migration by the Neo-Eskimo Thule. The Thule brought with them specialized technological developments adapted for the exploitation of terrestrial and marine resources in the warming climate, particularly whaling. The Iñupiat/Inuit people of today, while sharing common ancestry with all Native Americans, represent a distinct genetic contribution from later Beringians.

We investigated two pre-contact archaeological sites with human burials. Nuvuk at Pt. Barrow, AK, with radiocarbon dates spanning Early Thule to modern Iñupiat Eskimo and Igliqtiqsiugvigruaq, a more recent (turn of the 19th century) and interior Alaskan site located inside the boundary of Kobuk Valley National Park, adjacent to the Kobuk River. Three individuals from each site were chosen for targeted mitochondrial capture and next-generation sequencing. Our ancient DNA results allow refinement of phylogeny and coalescence dates for Arctic-specific mitochondrial clades, and demonstrate continuity between prehistoric and extant Arctic populations.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Society for American Archaeology 81st Annual Meeting, Orlando, FL (2016)   •
• Primer of the Ancient Mariner: New Perspectives on aDNA Research and the Prehistoric Colonization of Islands

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