While a comparatively young area of research, investigations relying on ancient DNA data have been highly valuable in revealing snapshots of genetic variation in both the recent and the not-so-recent past. Born out of a tradition of single-locus PCR-based approaches that often target individual species, stringent criteria for both data acquisition and analysis were introduced early to establish high standards of data quality. Today, the immense volume of data made available through next-generation sequencing has significantly increased the analytical resolution offered by processing ancient tissues and permits parallel analyses of host and microbial communities. The adoption of this new approach to data acquisition, however, requires an accompanying update on methods of DNA authentication, especially given that ancient molecules are expected to exist in low proportions in archaeological material, where an environmental signal is likely to dominate. In this review, we provide a summary of recent data authentication approaches that have been successfully used to distinguish between endogenous and nonendogenous DNA sequences in metagenomic data sets. While our discussion mostly centers on the detection of ancient human and ancient bacterial pathogen DNA, their applicability is far wider.

尽管是一个相对较年轻的研究领域，但依靠古老的DNA数据进行的研究对于揭示近期和不太过去的遗传变异的快照非常有价值。起源于通常以单个位点为基础的基于单基因座PCR的方法的传统，早期引入了严格的数据采集和分析标准，以建立高标准的数据质量。如今，通过下一代测序获得的大量数据已大大提高了处理古代组织所提供的分析分辨率，并允许对宿主和微生物群落进行并行分析。但是，采用这种新的数据采集方法需要对DNA验证方法进行相应的更新，尤其是考虑到考古分子中可能存在低比例的古代分子，而环境信号很可能占主导地位。在这篇综述中，我们提供了最近的数据身份验证方法的摘要，这些方法已成功用于区分宏基因组数据集中的内源性和非内源性DNA序列。尽管我们的讨论主要集中在对古代人类和古代细菌病原体DNA的检测上，但它们的适用性要广泛得多。