LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA—Researchers from the University of California, Los Angeles, analyzed the complete genomes of 19 wolves, 25 wild dogs from ten different countries, and 46 domesticated dogs from 34 different breeds. They found that domestication, which occurred more than 15,000 years ago through artificial selection and inbreeding, may have led to harmful genetic changes in dogs. “Population bottlenecks tied to domestication, rather than recent inbreeding, likely led to an increased frequency of deleterious genetic variations in dogs,” Kirk Lohmueller said in a press release. Those ancient changes could lead to developmental disorders and other health risks for today’s dogs. To read more about archaeological evidence of dogs, go to "More Than Man's Best Friend."
