Archaeological Recovery of Late Pleistocene Hair and Environmental DNA from Interior Alaska

Ancient hair and remnant plant DNA are important environmental proxies that preserve for millennia in specific archaeological contexts. However, recovery has been rare from late Pleistocene sites and more may be found if deliberately sought. Once discovered, singular hair fragments are not easily identified to taxa through comparative analyses and environmental DNA (eDNA) extraction can be difficult depending on preservation or contamination. In this paper, we present our methods for the combined recovery of ancient hair specimens and eDNA from sediments to improve our understanding of late Pleistocene environments from the Holzman site along Shaw Creek in interior Alaska. The approach serves as a useful case study for learning more about local environmental changes.

Automated summary

Ancient hair and remnant plant DNA are important environmental proxies that can be preserved for thousands of years in specific archaeological contexts. This paper presents the methods for recovering ancient hair specimens and eDNA from the Holzman site in order to improve our understanding of the late Pleistocene environment in interior Alaska.