Ancient DNA gives rare snapshot of Neanderthal family ties

NEW YORK (AP) — A new study suggests Neanderthals formed small, tightknit communities where females may have traveled to move in with their mates.

The research used genetic sleuthing to offer a rare snapshot of Neanderthal family dynamics — including a father and his teenage daughter who lived together in Siberia more than 50,000 years ago.

Researchers were able to pull DNA out of tiny bone fragments found in two Russian caves. In their study, published Wednesday in the journal Nature, they used the genetic data to map out relationships between 13 different Neanderthals and get clues to how they lived.

“When I work on a bone or two, it’s very easy to forget that these are actually people with their own lives and stories,” said study author Bence Viola, an anthropologist at the University of Toronto. “Figuring out how they’re related to each other really makes them much more human.”

Our ancient cousins, the Neanderthals, lived across Europe and Asia for hundreds of thousands of years. They died out around 40,000 years ago, shortly after our species, the Homo sapiens, arrived in Europe from Africa.

Scientists have only recently been able to dig around in these early humans' DNA. New Nobel laureate Svante Paabo — who is an author on this latest study — published the first draft of a Neanderthal genome a little over a decade ago.

Since then, scientists have sequenced 18 Neanderthal genomes, said lead author Laurits Skov, a geneticist at the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology. But it's rare to find bones from multiple Neanderthals from the same time and place, he said — which is why these cave discoveries were so special.

“If there was ever a chance to find a Neanderthal community, this would be it,” Skov said.

The caves, located in remote foothills above...