An international group of geneticists and archaeologists, led by the Francis Crick Institute, have found that the ancestry of dogs can be traced to at least two populations of ancient wolves. The work moves us a step closer to uncovering the mystery of where dogs underwent domestication, one of the biggest unanswered questions about human prehistory.

Horse domestication revolutionized warfare and accelerated travel, trade and the geographic expansion of languages. This study presents the largest genome-scale time-series for a non-human organism to access the legacy of past equestrian civilizations in the genetic makeup of modern horses.

Human populations and breeds of domestic animals are composed of individuals with a multiplicity of eye (= iris) colorations. Some wild birds and mammals may have intraspecific eye color variability, but this variation seems to be due to the developmental stage of the individual, its breeding status, and/or sexual dimorphism. In other words, eye colour tends to be a species-specific trait in wild animals, and the exceptions are species in which individuals of the same age group or gender all...