【精英翻譯】的部落格

World’s oldest DNA sequenced from million-year-old mammoths

科學家從百萬年猛獁象定序全球最古老DNA

精英翻譯社轉自https://features.ltn.com.tw/english/article/paper/1435663

◎陳成良

Teeth from mammoths buried in the Siberian permafrost for more than a million years have yielded the world’s oldest DNA ever sequenced, according to a study published on Wednesday, shining the genetic searchlight into the deep past.

據週三公布的研究，埋在西伯利亞永凍土層超過100萬年的猛獁象牙齒，提供全球最古老的去氧核醣核酸（DNA）定序，讓基因研究的探照燈指向遙遠的過去。

Researchers said the three specimens, one roughly 800,000 years old and two over a million years old, provide important insights into the giant Ice Age mammals, including the ancient heritage of the woolly mammoth.

研究人員表示，這3個樣本，一個約有80萬年歷史，另2個來自超過100萬年前，為現代人瞭解冰河時代猛獁象，包括「真長毛象」（woolly mammoth）的古老傳承，提供重要觀察角度。

The genomes far exceed the oldest previously sequenced DNA － a horse dating between 780,000 to 560,000 years ago.

此前，最古老的DNA定序來自78萬年前到56萬年前的一匹馬，而這些猛獁象基因組的年代更久遠得多。

The mammoths were originally discovered in the 1970s in Siberia and held at the Russian Academy of Sciences in Moscow.

這幾頭猛獁象起初於1970年代在西伯利亞地區被發現，由莫斯科的俄羅斯科學院保管。