ERC Advanced Grant · 2020
BACKWARD will address major unsettled debates about African and Asian extinct hominid phylogeny, by developing and deploying a new generation of palaeoproteomic workflows, relying on the most advanced mass spectrometry and bioinformatic solutions currently available. Ancient DNA (aDNA) sequencing revolutionised our knowledge on evolution, migration and admixture of archaic and anatomically modern humans. However, no hominid aDNA older than ~0.4 million years has been retrieved yet. Ancient proteins instead survive much longer than aDNA, enabling molecular-based phylogeny beyond the limits of aDNA degradation. Recently, mass spectrometry (MS)-based ancient protein sequencing, i.e.…
From the public funding record at EU CORDIS. Describes the funded project, not the reviews below.