50,000-year-old DNA reveals the first-ever look at a Neanderthal family

The first glimpse of a Neanderthal family has been found in a cave in Siberia. The most complete set of Neanderthal genomes to date was found when a group of adults and kids died while hiding at their hunting camp.

There is evidence of an extinct species of hominin called the Denisovans in the west of Denisova Cave. The Chagyrskaya Cave was dated to between 51,000 and 59,000 years old. The climate was very cold when Neanderthals were in Chagyrskaya.

A new analysis in the journal Nature sheds light on the genetics of the Neanderthals. The 13 genomes yielded by the study doubled the number of complete Neanderthal genomes. The new analysis directly tested the hypothesis that Neanderthals lived in groups of 20 or fewer people.

Neanderthals and humans were hooking up a lot more than people thought.

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The first evidence of Neanderthal family relationships was found in the genetic data of 11 Neanderthals. It was possible for an adult male and an adolescent female to be mother and son, brother and sister, or father and daughter with the help of their genetic material.

Researchers face-to-face with a father and his daughter after they ruled out the first two combinations because of their non matching mtDNA. The authors suggested that the father and two other males could have shared a maternal relative.

The Neanderthals were likely in the same place at the same time as the Denisovans. According to the researchers, the Denisovans and the Chagyrskaya Neandertals are related to European Neanderthals and were part of the same family tens of thousands of years ago.

The researchers found that the local community size of the Chagyrskaya Neanderthals was small. The best scenario would have a community of 20 individuals with female migration being a major factor in the social organization of the Chagyrskaya Neanderthal community. Some females stayed with the group they were born into while others left their communities to join new ones. The researchers don't know if this group size can be applied outside the Altai region, as the Chagyrskaya group may have been a unique example.

The Neanderthals may have been undone by isolation. A paleogeneticist and lead author told The New York Times that the group may have died of starvation due to poor bison hunting. After all they are in Siberia.