Male European bison, Poland.
Rafal Kowalczyk.
European bison, Poland.
Rafal Kowalczyk.
From time
to time we hear discussion of the possibility of using cave paintings and other
rock art to add to scientific knowledge by identifying animals by species for a
given time period and/or location. We now may have an example of just that.
Writing in Smithsonian.com of October 19, 2016, Jason Daley reported on a paper
from Science by Jessica Boddy that announces that genetic testing, confirmed by
cave art, has discovered an unknown species of European bison. Named the
"Higgs Bison", a tongue-in-cheek reference to the Higgs Boson
particle only recently detected by physicists after a 50-year search.
First detected when a team at the
Australian Centre for Ancient DNA at the University of Adelaide, led by Alan
Cooper, began sequencing DNA from ancient European bison looking for past
impacts of climate change. The DNA from many of the bones had a different
genetic makeup to anything they had previously known, which looked to them like
a new species.
Aurochs, Lascaux Cave, France.
Photograph public domain.
"The researchers dubbed the creature Bison-X and
Higgs Bison. Furtheer examination of the DNA showed that this new animal was
actually a hybrid between the steppe bison and the aurochs, a species of wild
cattle believed to be the ancestor of modern cows Beyond that the researchers
knew very little about the animal including what it looked like." (Daley 2016)
Aurochs, Lascaux Cave, France.
Photograph public domain.
"Cooper
contacted French cave researchers to see if the animal might have been captured
by the hunters who decorated the caves of Lascaux and Pergouset. And indeed
there was a record of this creature." (Daley 2016)
Steppe bison, Chauvet cave, France.
httpwww.zmescience.com - public domain.
Steppe bison, Chauvet cave, France.
httpwww.zmescience.com - public domain.
They
found that images of cave bison which could be dated to between 18,000 to
22,000 years ago clearly depict the steppe bison with its long horns and stout
forequarters. However images from 5,000 years later show a creature without
such a barrel chest and thinner horns. Researchers of cave art had previously
assumed that the differences were ones of style and regional variation in
portrayals.
Researchers
believe that the shift in dominant types was likely due to the periodic
changing climates in the Paleolithic period. "Cooper and his colleagues traced the Higgs Bison back over
120,000 years using DNA from fossil bones from Europe, the Urals and the Caucusus Mountains, according to a press
release. During warm spells, the steppe bison was the dominant bovine in
western Eurasia. During cold spells, the fossil record suggests that the hybrid
animals did better. While the steppe bison eventually went extinct, Higgs Bison
survived and is the ancient ancestor of modern European bison." (Daley
2016)
"'Once formed, the new hybrid species
seems to have successfully carved out a niche on the landscape, and kept to
itself genetically,' Cooper says in the press release. 'It dominated during
colder tundra-like periods, without the warm summers, and was the largest
European species to survive the megafaunal extinctions.'" (Daley 2016)
Wisent, Higgs bison, Lorblanchet cave,
France. www.zmescience.com.
Public domain.
Wisent, Higgs bison
Public domain.
One
contributing factor in the large difference observed in the genome of the Higgs
Bison compared to the European Bison is that the modern European Bison went
through a genetic bottleneck. During the 1920s the population declined to only
12 animals so the genome looks quite different from its ancient ancestors.
(Daley 2016)
With
the origin of the hybrid bison traced back to approximately 120,000 years we
now have to wonder if the North American bison also carries the genetic markers
of the hybrid species. There would have been plenty of opportunity for them to
enter North America across Beringia. Careful analysis of North American rock
art and genetic testing of Bison bison DNA could reveal new information as
well.
(Read the whole story at:
http://www.smithsonianmag./smart-news/how-cave-art-helped-dig-new-animal-species-180960833/#lcLx3TozUKrd8Hah.99)
REFERENCE:
Daley,
Jason
2016 Cave Paintings Help Unravel the Mystery
of the 'Higgs Bison', http://www.smithsonianmag.com, October 19, 2016
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