Hundreds of new primate genomes offer window into human health —and our past

Humans have long seen themselves mirrored in other primates, with apes’ social behavior and cognitive abilities shedding light on our own. Now, two international teams have stared deeper into the mirror. By sequencing the genomes of more than 200 nonhuman primates, from palm-size mouse lemurs to 200-kilogram gorillas, they have come up with clues to human health and disease, and to the origin of our species. The genomes and their analyses , reported today in Science and Science Advances , represent a massive effort involving more than 100 researchers from about 20 countries who braved logistical challenges and bureaucratic gauntlets to collect blood samples from some 800 wild and captive primates. The resulting data show how knowing a primate’s genetic diversity could improve the odds of saving highly endangered species. But our own species could also benefit. One team used the genomes to train a machine learning tool that could assess whether human genetic variants are likely to cause disease. And both explored the complexity of primates’ evolution, shedding light on our own. “This massive sample will ultimately spark new and unexpected research directly relevant to human origins,” says Luis Darcy Verde Arregoitia, a mammalogist at the Mexico Institute of Ecology who was not involved with either group. The bigger of the two genome efforts was spearheaded not by a primatologist or evolutionary biologist, but a clinical...
Source: Science of Aging Knowledge Environment - Category: Geriatrics Source Type: research