18. Gene Flow and Ancient DNA: Trees with Connecting Branches

Abstract

Mainly, however, while admixture between modern human populations had always somehow been granted and gene flow between modern and archaic populations had not entirely been ruled out, trees were what was being built in human population genetics. The accessibility of ancient DNA (aDNA) in quality, quantity, and increasing time-depth initiated the emergence of aDNA population genomics, and, with this, revolutionary insights like modern-human–Neanderthal interbreeding made news. In spite of this, aDNA studies did not really overthrow the tree diagram. Even while gene flow was often assumed to have taken place over long periods of time, the core diagram of evolution simply acquired a few connecting arrows between branches.