Sheep retroviruses can be used to map the selective preferences of early farmers and trace livestock movements across Europe.

The emergence of farming during the Neolithic transition, including the domestication of livestock, was a critical point in the evolution of human kind. The goat ( Capra hircus ) was one of the first domesticated ungulates. In this study, we compared the genetic diversity of domestic goats to that of the modern representatives of their wild ancestor, the bezoar, by analyzing 473 samples collected over the whole distribution range of the latter species. This partly confirms and significantly clarifies the goat domestication scenario already proposed by archaeological evidence. All of the mitochondrial DNA haplogroups found in current domestic goats have also been found in the bezoar. The geographic distribution of these haplogroups in the wild ancestor allowed the localization of the main domestication centers. We found no haplotype that could have been domesticated in the eastern half of the Iranian Plateau, nor further to the east. A signature of population expansion in bezoars of the C haplogroup suggests an early domestication center on the Central Iranian Plateau (Yazd and Kerman Provinces) and in the Southern Zagros (Fars Province), possibly corresponding to the management of wild flocks. However, the contribution of this center to the current domestic goat population is rather low (1.4%). We also found a second domestication center covering a large area in Eastern Anatolia, and possibly in Northern and Central Zagros. This last domestication center is the likely origin of almost all domestic goats today. This finding is consistent with archaeological data identifying Eastern Anatolia as an important domestication center.

The evolutionary basis of domestication has been a longstanding question and its genetic architecture is becoming more tractable as more domestic species become genome-enabled. Before becoming established worldwide, sheep and goats were domesticated in the fertile crescent 10,500 years before present (YBP) where their wild relatives remain. Here we sequence the genomes of wild Asiatic mouflon and Bezoar ibex in the sheep and goat domestication center and compare their genomes with that of domestics from local, traditional, and improved breeds. Among the genomic regions carrying selective sweeps differentiating domestic breeds from wild populations, which are associated among others to genes involved in nervous system, immunity and productivity traits, 20 are common toCapraandOvis. The patterns of selection vary between species, suggesting that while common targets of selection related to domestication and improvement exist, different solutions have arisen to achieve similar phenotypic end-points within these closely related livestock species.