Population genetics of Ancient Western Europe

Abstract

The field of Ancient DNA has been the subject of significant progress during the last decade, shifting from the analysis of a few hundred basepairs to whole-genome data. The main advantage of ancient DNA is the direct sampling of the past, allowing for powerful inferences about human demography and evolution that would not be attainable from modern data. In this thesis, I present sequence and analysis of data generated by me from human remains ranging from the Neolithic to the 15-17th century AD and demonstrate the utility of ancient DNA for the investigation of past population history.