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An analysis involving the shotgun sequencing of more than 300 ancient genomes from Eurasia reveals a deep east–west genetic divide from the Black Sea to the Baltic, and provides insight into the distinct effects of the Neolithic transition on either side of this boundary.

Ancient DNA analyses reveal that Viking Age migrations from Scandinavia resulted in differential influxes of ancestry to different parts of Europe, and the increased presence of non-local ancestry within Scandinavia.

Analyses of imputed ancient genomes and of samples from the UK Biobank indicate that ancient selection and migration were large contributors to the distribution of phenotypic diversity in present-day Europeans.

Single-cell analyses in a reporter mouse model and human tissues identify a rare cell subset that produces erythropoietin in vivo, opening potential new avenues for research in erythropoiesis and oxygen homeostasis.

The chronology and mode of parallel evolution remain unclear. Here, the authors compare mid-Holocene and contemporary bottlenose dolphin adaptations between pelagic and coastal ecosystems with paleogenomics, finding rapid adaptation to newly emerged habitat from standing genetic variation.

Here, the authors look at present day and medieval genome samples from Northern France to piece together demographic history and population structure across Brittany and the Loire basin.

The bird skull arose from the nonavian dinosaur skull by several episodes of paedomorphosis, in which descendants resemble the juveniles of their ancestors, according to a study of shape change during dinosaur ontogeny and phylogeny.

A large-scale metagenomic analysis of plant and mammal environmental DNA reveals complex ecological changes across the circumpolar region over the past 50,000 years, as biota responded to changing climates, culminating in the postglacial extinction of large mammals and emergence of modern ecosystems.

Whole-genome sequence data for 108 individuals representing 28 language groups across Australia and five language groups for Papua New Guinea suggests that Aboriginal Australians and Papuans diverged from Eurasian populations approximately 60–100 thousand years ago, following a single out-of-Africa dispersal and subsequent admixture with archaic populations.

Deep whole-genome sequencing of 300 individuals from 142 diverse populations provides insights into key population genetic parameters, shows that all modern human ancestry outside of Africa including in Australasians is consistent with descending from a single founding population, and suggests a higher rate of accumulation of mutations in non-Africans compared to Africans since divergence.

Ancient DNA keeps expanding our understanding of complex genetic relationships between Pleistocene hominins. Here, Posth and colleagues analyse the mitochondrial genome of an archaic human that diverged from other Neanderthals ∼270,000 years ago, providing the minimum age for an African introgression into Neanderthals.

Analyses of the proteomes of dental enamel from Homo antecessor and Homo erectus demonstrate that the Early Pleistocene H. antecessor is a close sister lineage of later Homo sapiens, Neanderthal and Denisovan populations in Eurasia.

A complete genome sequence is presented of a female Neanderthal from Siberia, providing information about interbreeding between close relatives and uncovering gene flow events among Neanderthals, Denisovans and early modern humans, as well as establishing substitutions that became fixed in modern humans after their separation from the ancestors of Neanderthals and Denisovans.

The analysis of whole-genome sequence data from both modern and ancient humans has provided evidence for archaic adaptive introgression. Here, the authors provide an overview of the statistical methods used and the supporting evidence for reported examples of archaic introgression, which may have driven the acquisition of beneficial variants that enabled adaptation and survival in new environments.

With the increasing availability of ancient genomes from the same region or locality, the field of human history has started to address sociocultural aspects of human behaviour. The authors review recent case studies reconstructing the social consequences of past human migrations and advocate that this complex enterprise should be addressed by multidisciplinary teams.

The diverse physiography of the Portuguese land and marine territory, spanning from continental Europe to the Atlantic archipelagos, has made it an important repository of biodiversity throughout the Pleistocene glacial cycles, leading to a remarkable diversity of species and ecosystems. This rich biodiversity is under threat from anthropogenic drivers, such as climate change, invasive species, land use changes, overexploitation, or pathogen (re)emergence. The inventory, characterisation, and study of biodiversity at inter- and intra-specific levels using genomics is crucial to promote its preservation and recovery by informing biodiversity conservation policies, management measures, and research. The participation of researchers from Portuguese institutions in the European Reference Genome Atlas (ERGA) initiative and its pilot effort to generate reference genomes for European biodiversity has reinforced the establishment of Biogenome Portugal. This nascent institutional network will connect the national community of researchers in genomics. Here, we describe the Portuguese contribution to ERGA’s pilot effort, which will generate high-quality reference genomes of six species from Portugal that are endemic, iconic, and/or endangered and include plants, insects, and vertebrates (fish, birds, and mammals) from mainland Portugal or the Azores islands. In addition, we outline the objectives of Biogenome Portugal, which aims to (i) promote scientific collaboration, (ii) contribute to advanced training, (iii) stimulate the participation of institutions and researchers based in Portugal in international biodiversity genomics initiatives, and (iv) contribute to the transfer of knowledge to stakeholders and engaging the public to preserve biodiversity. This initiative will strengthen biodiversity genomics research in Portugal and fuel the genomic inventory of Portuguese eukaryotic species. Such efforts will be critical to the conservation of the country’s rich biodiversity and will contribute to ERGA’s goal of generating reference genomes for European species.