Biology Faculty Articles
Title
The Near Eastern Origin of Cat Domestication
Document Type
Article
Publication Date
7-27-2007
Publication Title
Science
ISSN
0036-8075
Volume
317
Issue/No.
5837
First Page
519
Last Page
523
Abstract
The world's domestic cats carry patterns of sequence variation in their genome that reflect a history of domestication and breed development. A genetic assessment of 979 domestic cats and their wild progenitors- Felis silvestris silvestris (European wildcat), F. s. lybica (Near Eastern wildcat), F. s. ornata (central Asian wildcat), F. s. cafra (southern African wildcat), and F. s. bieti (Chinese desert cat)- indicated that each wild group represents a distinctive subspecies of Felis silvestris. Further analysis revealed that cats were domesticated in the Near East, probably coincident with agricultural village development in the Fertile Crescent. Domestic cats derive from at least five founders from across this region, whose descendants were transported across the world by human assistance.
Additional Comments
National Cancer Institute contract #: N01-CO-12400; GenBank accession #s: EF587016-EF587179
NSUWorks Citation
Driscoll, Carlos A.; Marilyn Menotti-Raymond; Alfred L. Roca; Karsten Hupe; Warren E. Johnson; Eli Geffen; Eric H. Harley; M. Delibes; Dominique Pontier; Andrew C. Kitchener; Nobuyuki Yamaguchi; Stephen J. O'Brien; and David W. Macdonald. 2007. "The Near Eastern Origin of Cat Domestication." Science 317, (5837): 519-523. https://nsuworks.nova.edu/cnso_bio_facarticles/510
ORCID ID
0000-0001-7353-8301
ResearcherID
N-1726-2015
Comments
©2007 American Association for the Advancement of Science