DATE2026.08.18 #Press Releases

Cold-Climate Adaptations of East Eurasian Hunter-Gatherers Who Lived During the Ice Age, as Revealed by the Jomon Genome

Disclaimer: machine translated by DeepL which may contain errors.

—Ancient DNA Sheds Light on the Evolutionary Legacy of the Late Paleolithic—

Summary

Yusuke Watanabe, Project Assistant Professor; Yoshiki Wakiyama, Graduate student ; and Professor Hiroki Oota of the Graduate School of Science, The University of Tokyo; Professor Yasuhiro Yamada and Associate Professor Masami Izuho of the Graduate School of Humanities at Tokyo Metropolitan University;Associate Professor Takayuki Nishimura of the Graduate School of Design, Kyushu University, and others have used the genomes of Jomon people to reveal the history of the formation of Late Paleolithic hunter-gatherer populations in East Eurasia and evidence of their adaptation to cold environments.

In this study, we integrated the ancient genomes  of 42 Jomon individuals—comprising 25 individuals newly extracted and sequenced by our team and 17 previously reported individuals—and performed data analysis using high-performance computing.The results showed that the ancestral population of the Jomon people originated from a lineage that diverged from East Eurasian populations on the continent approximately 27,000 to 19,000 years ago. Archaeologically, this period corresponds to the Late Paleolithic era and coincides almost exactly with the coldest phase of the Last Glacial Maximum.

Through a whole-genome natural selection scan, we identified traces consistent with adaptation to cold environments in multiple gene regions associated with thermogenesis in brown adipose tissue, lipid metabolism, and cold sensitivity. In particular, the APOA5 gene region showed evidence of a rapid increase in mutation frequency during the period corresponding to the Last Glacial Maximum.This study demonstrates that the Jōmon genome is not only a clue to understanding the origins of the people of the Japanese archipelago but also a valuable record for deciphering the evolution and adaptation of East Eurasian populations who lived through the Ice Age. These findings present a new framework for reconstructing past environmental adaptations from ancient genomes.

Population History and Cold Adaptation in Paleolithic Populations of the Japanese Archipelago

Journals

Journal Name	Science Advances
Paper Title	Jomon genomics reveal cold adaptation in Upper Paleolithic hunter-gatherers of eastern Eurasia
Authors	Yusuke Watanabe, Yoshiki Wakiyama, Daisuke Waku, Guido Valverde, Akio Tanino, Mizuki Hayashi, Izumi Naka, Yuka Nakamura, Tsubasa Suzuki, Kae Koganebuchi, Takashi Gakuhari, Takafumi Katsumura, Motoyuki Ogawa, Atsushi Toyoda, Pornlada Nuchnoi, Suwanna Chaorattanakawee, Hathairad Hananantachai, Jintana Patarapotikul, Soichiro Mizushima, Tomohito Nagaoka, Kazuaki Hirata, Minoru Yoneda, Midori Motoi, Hideo Toyoshima, Takafumi Maeda, Takayuki Nishimura, Tadayuki Masuyama, Yasuhiro Yamada, Ryuzaburo Takahashi, Masami Izuho, Jun Ohashi, NCBN Controls WGS Consortium, Hiroki Oota
DOI	10.1126/sciadv.aea7469