Older origins of measles virus Animal domestication by humans is thought to have given many pathogens an opportunity to invade a new host, and measles is one example of this. However, there is controversy about when measles emerged in humans, because the historical descriptions of measles are relatively recent (late ninth century CE). The controversy has persisted in part because ancient RNA is thought to be a poor target for molecular clock techniques. Düx et al. have overcome the ancient RNA challenge by sequencing a measles virus genome obtained from a museum specimen of the lungs of child who died in 1912 (see the Perspective by Ho and Duchêne). The authors used these and other more recent sequencing data in a Bayesian molecular clock–modeling technique, which showed that measles virus diverged from rinderpest virus in the sixth century BCE, indicating an early origin for measles possibly associated with the beginnings of urbanization. Science, this issue p. 1367; see also p. 1310 Measles virus diverged from rinderpest virus in the sixth century BCE, indicating an early origin for human measles. Many infectious diseases are thought to have emerged in humans after the Neolithic revolution. Although it is broadly accepted that this also applies to measles, the exact date of emergence for this disease is controversial. We sequenced the genome of a 1912 measles virus and used selection-aware molecular clock modeling to determine the divergence date of measles virus and rinderpest virus. This divergence date represents the earliest possible date for the establishment of measles in human populations. Our analyses show that the measles virus potentially arose as early as the sixth century BCE, possibly coinciding with the rise of large cities.

中文翻译：

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麻疹病毒和牛瘟病毒的分歧可追溯到公元前六世纪

麻疹病毒的较旧起源 人类驯化动物被认为为许多病原体提供了入侵新宿主的机会，麻疹就是一个例子。然而，关于麻疹何时出现在人类身上存在争议，因为对麻疹的历史描述是相对较新的（公元 9 世纪后期）。争议之所以持续存在，部分原因是古代 RNA 被认为是分子钟技术的不良目标。杜克斯等人。通过对从 1912 年去世的儿童肺的博物馆标本中获得的麻疹病毒基因组进行测序，克服了古老的 RNA 挑战（参见 Ho 和 Duchêne 的观点）。作者在贝叶斯分子钟建模技术中使用了这些和其他最近的测序数据，该技术表明麻疹病毒在公元前 6 世纪与牛瘟病毒分离，表明麻疹的早期起源可能与城市化的开始有关。科学，这个问题 p。第1367章 另见第 1310 公元前 6 世纪，麻疹病毒与牛瘟病毒分离，表明人类麻疹的起源较早。许多传染病被认为是在新石器时代革命之后在人类中出现的。尽管人们普遍认为这也适用于麻疹，但这种疾病的确切出现日期仍存在争议。我们对 1912 年麻疹病毒的基因组进行了测序，并使用具有选择意识的分子钟模型来确定麻疹病毒和牛瘟病毒的分化日期。这个分歧日期代表了麻疹在人群中形成的最早可能日期。