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GENOME FINDINGS. “Our results suggest (1) limited Y. pestis diversity during the early phase of the Black Death, and likely a single entry into Europe; (2) a wave of plague that traveled eastward after the Black Death and later gave rise to the 19th century pandemic; and (3) an involvement of the same plague lineage in two post-Black Death European epidemics that are 200 years apart.” https://lnkd.in/g9Pgxuv View in LinkedIn

FRAGMENT FROM NATURE continues from last weekend on the topic of the Black Death. There has been a lengthy debate as to whether there was more than one strain of the plague, and where it came from and where it went to. By using genomic sequencing, on human samples, these issues have been finally and resolved, some 700 years later. It is a lovely tribute to the power of modern sequencing. View in LinkedIn

EASTERN SPREAD. “Y. pestis spread from Europe to Asia after the Black Death and gave rise to both the 1.IN lineages of the Yunnan Province of China (1.IN3) as well as the 1.ORI strains associated with worldwide spread during the third plague pandemic.” https://lnkd.in/g9Pgxuv View in LinkedIn

SINGLE UNIFORM WAVE. “Barcelona was one of the main entry points for the Black Death into Europe, with historical reports suggesting the disease first entered there in the spring of 1348. In London, the earliest reports of the illness are from autumn 1348. This indicates a contemporary presence of the same strain in both southern and northern Europe, supporting the notion of a single wave entry, with low genetic diversity in the pathogen.” https://lnkd.in/g9Pgxuv View in LinkedIn

SAME LINEAGE CONFIRMED. “Our genomes from Barcelona, Bolgar City, and Ellwangen group on the same phylogenetic branch (Branch 1), adding further legitimacy to the notion that the Black Death and subsequent plague outbreaks in Europe, as well as the worldwide third pandemic, were caused by the same Y. pestis lineage.” https://lnkd.in/g9Pgxuv View in LinkedIn

GENOME SEQUENCING. “Following the success of previous genomic investigations of ancient bacterial disease, we employ similar methods of DNA capture and high-throughput sequencing to retrieve the genomes of three historical Y. pestis strains.” https://lnkd.in/g9Pgxuv View in LinkedIn

MOST LIKELY ROAD TO DIOECY. "Gynodioecy in plants is far more common than androdioecy and must be considered to be a more likely intermediate step to dioecy than is androdioecy. Dioecious species commonly have gynodioecious relatives." https://lnkd.in/gb3zS32 View in LinkedIn

LIKELY ROADS. "It is far more likely that dioecy has evolved through gynodioecy as an intermediate (the coexistence of females and hermaphrodites) or through androdioecy (the coexistence of males and hermaphrodites). In both cases, the initial step is the establishment of a single mutant form." https://lnkd.in/gb3zS32 View in LinkedIn

SO ENDS the vignette on the black death. This apocalyptic plague killed more people than any other in human history. It also destroyed the feudal system, significantly weakened Catholicism, brought better living conditions for the average person, and paved the way for the Renaissance. And it was a selective pressure that weeded out the frail and selected for a stringer genotype that would fare better in future outbreaks and left its mark in the human genome. https://lnkd.in/ganfYRw View in LinkedIn

PAVING WAY FOR THE RENAISSANCE. “The consequences of the Black Death pandemic allowed for explorations to occur that contributed to Europe’s emergence into the Renaissance, a turning point in Western thought defined by the revivals of Greek and Roman art and philosophy and by the exploration of ideas. The pandemic greatly contributed to the transformation of Europe’s economic and social systems.” https://lnkd.in/gyBNmBb View in LinkedIn