英国《每日邮报》报道，科学家表示，在阿尔卑斯山发现的一具5300年前的冰川木乃伊——“奥茨冰人”应属于此前不知道的一个人类族谱分支。这个分支的踪迹可能已经消失，意味着“奥茨冰人”不可能拥有任何后代。
“奥茨冰人”的木乃伊化尸体是1991年9月在奥地利-意大利边界附近的东阿尔卑斯山被发现的，暴卒时的年龄大约在46岁左右。检验结果显示，他曾经受过箭伤，死亡原因可能是面部遭受重击。自1998年以来，“奥茨冰人”便在意大利博尔札诺的南蒂罗尔考古学博物馆展出。目前，科学家已绘制出“奥茨冰人”线粒体DNA的完整图像，线粒体DNA通常由母亲传给下一代。线粒体相当于细胞中的小型“发电站”，能够产生能量。
在试图确定“奥茨冰人”属于人类族谱的哪一个分支时，研究小组得出惊人发现。虽然被归为一个名为“K1”的亚群，但“奥茨冰人”却不与已知3种K1“簇”中的任何一种匹配。利兹大学教授马丁·理查兹(Martin Richards)表示：“我们的分析结果证实‘奥茨冰人’属于一个未经确认的K1宗谱，迄今为止，这个宗谱已在欧洲消失了。遗传宗谱频率经常随时间发生改变，这种现象由后代的随机突变，也就是所说的‘遗传漂变’过程导致。作为这一过程的结果，一些突变消失了。我们的研究显示，‘奥茨冰人’宗谱可能已经灭绝了。”研究发现刊登在《当代生物学》（Current Biology）杂志上。（生物谷Bioon.com）
生物谷推荐原始出处：
Current Biology，doi:10.1016/j.cub.2008.09.028，Luca Ermini, Martin Richards, Franco Rollo
Complete Mitochondrial Genome Sequence of the Tyrolean Iceman
Luca Ermini1,3,4,Cristina Olivieri1,4,Ermanno Rizzi2,Giorgio Corti2,Raoul Bonnal2,Pedro Soares3,Stefania Luciani1,Isolina Marota1,Gianluca De Bellis2,Martin B. Richards3andFranco Rollo1,,
1 Laboratorio di Archeo-Antropologia Molecolare/DNA Antico, Dipartimento di Biologia Molecolare, Cellulare e Animale, University of Camerino, 62032 Camerino, Italy
2 Istituto di Tecnologie Biomediche, Consiglio Nazionale delle Ricerche, 20090 Milano, Italy
3 Institute of Integrative and Comparative Biology, Faculty of Biological Sciences, University of Leeds, LS2 9JT Leeds, UK
SUMMARY
The Tyrolean Iceman was a witness to the NeolithicCopper Age transition in Central Europe 53505100 years ago, and his mummified corpse was recovered from an Alpine glacier on the Austro-Italian border in 1991 . Using a mixed sequencing procedure based on PCR amplification and 454 sequencing of pooled amplification products, we have retrieved the first complete mitochondrial-genome sequence of a prehistoric European. We have then compared it with 115 related extant lineages from mitochondrial haplogroup K. We found that the Iceman belonged to a branch of mitochondrial haplogroup K1 that has not yet been identified in modern European populations. This is the oldest complete Homo sapiens mtDNA genome generated to date. The results point to the potential significance of complete-ancient-mtDNA studies in addressing questions concerning the genetic history of human populations that the phylogeography of modern lineages is unable to tackle.
