recently, the team led by prof. guanghui dong of college of earth and environmental sciences, lanzhou university and the team led by research professor qingpeng kong from kunming institute of zoology, chinese academy of sciences (cas) collaboratively published an article entitled “neolithic millet farmers contributed to the permanent settlement of the tibetan plateau by adopting barley agriculture” on the international comprehensive academic journalnational science review (the latest impact factor is 13.222). the first author was dr. yuchun li (kunming institute of zoology, cas), the co-corresponding authors were prof. dong and prof. kong, and the academician fahu chen (lanzhou university) and dr. fengwen liu both were co-authors.
this research not only confirmed the existence of a large number of genetic components from the millet farmers originating from northern china in the tibetans, but also showed that the millet farmers adopted cold-tolerant barley agriculture and further migrated to high altitudes after long-term settlement in the low-altitude areas of the tibetan plateau, eventually settled in the tibetan plateau on a large scale permanently. this study has important implications for a deep understanding of the pattern of barley agriculture spreading to the plateau and the history of an evolution of tibetan people in the plateau. the research was supported by grants from the strategic priority research program of chinese academy of sciences, and (prof. dong and prof. kong are in charge) and outstanding youth program of national natural science foundation of china.
