Adenovirus C appeared much earlier than humans Homo sapiens

In the new work, scientists analyzed children's milk teeth, which are more than 30 thousand years old. Researchers

found traces of DNA from several commonviruses. Among them was adenovirus C, which is responsible for the common cold. Thus, he is much older than modern humans. Most likely, the virus appeared on Earth more than 700,000 years ago and the ancestors of Homo sapiens, the Neanderthals, suffered from a runny nose.

This is the oldest known evidence of viral infections found in humans. Previously, scientists believed that adenovirus C originated only 7,000 years ago.

According to researchers, a comparison of the ancientstrain of adenovirus with modern strains suggests that their common ancestor appeared between 487 and 963 thousand years ago, and most likely - 702 thousand years ago.

In their work, biologists studied teeth discovered in Siberia in 2019.

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