A new study suggests that dogs may have originated from Europe. This is after studying the DNA of ancient dog and wolf samples and comparing it to modern samples.
Olaf Thalmann, lead author of the study, and his colleagues did an analysis on 18 different genetic sequences of prehistoric wolves and dogs which go back as far as 18,000 years ago. They also took DNA samples from 77 modern day dogs, 49 wolves and four coyotes.
Scientists have accepted that dogs are descendants of the grey wolf but have varying opinions when it comes to its origin and date of existence. There was an earlier study which suggested that dogs may have come from the Middle East or somewhere in East Asia based on a 15,000-year-old evidence.
Researchers believe that they are able to provide a stronger evidence that dogs are from Europe and not from anywhere outside Europe. Their evidence is 3,000-year-old earlier than the previous study. It also suggests that dogs may have been existent even before humans were able to learn hunting and gathering. Humans learned to tame dogs and used them as protection from other predators.
"You have to remember that 18,800-32,000 years ago, Europe had much bigger predators than even wolves, such as bears and hyenas. And you can imagine that having wolves living close to you might be a very useful alarm system," he told BBC. "It's a plausible scenario for the origin of the domestication of dogs."
Despite this new evidence, the researchers admitted that additional study is needed especially on the core of the ancient DNA. This is because humans have traveled around the planet with dogs as their companions.
The University of Arizona psychology professor Clive D.L. Wynne, who is not part of the study, said that the new evidence is not enough to end the debate about the origin of dogs. "I don't think the geneticists have the reliable evidence to date the origin of dogs," he told NBC.
The study was published in the Nov. 15 issue of the online journal Science.
