Ancient DNA from wild boar fossils in Guangxi and its implication for pig domestication

Pig domestication has long been an issue of interest in archaeology and genetics.As the real-time carrier of the genetic information for historical or extinct animals,ancient DNA may provide continuous molecular evidence for tracing the history of domestication.We collected 30 wild boar fossils of Late Pleistocene from three caves in Guangxi,Southwest China.Through the use of the fragmented ancient DNA sequences from southern China and homologous sequences of both domestic and wild boars across Asia and Europe,we reconstructed the Network phylogeny of the pig family.The results agree with the multiple-origin-center-theory for pig domestication.Moreover,we found that the wild boar individual from Guangxi clustered into the European haplotype instead of the Asian one.It seems that there is no genetic contribution from the wild boar to the domesticated pig in Guangxi.We suggest that the previous opinion of independent pig domestication event has occurred in this area need reconsideration and further investigation.