喜馬拉雅骷髏湖之謎

High in the Himalayas of India, amid the snow-capped peaks, nestles a mystery.

印度區(qū)域的喜馬拉雅山高地，白雪覆蓋的山巔之中，棲息著一個謎。

Roopkund Lake is a shallow body of water filled with human bones - the skeletons of hundreds of individuals.

路普康湖水體很淺，充滿了人類的骨骼--數(shù)百個人的骷髏。

It's these that give the lake its other name, Skeleton Lake, and no one knows how the remains came to be there.

因此這個湖有了另一個名字，骷髏湖。沒人知道這些遺骸是如何到達這里的。

One hypothesis is that some catastrophe, a single event such as a powerful storm, had befallen a large group of people. But DNA analysis of 38 of the skeletons has turned that idea on its head.

一種假設是，某個災難，一個單一的事件，比如一場強大的風暴，降臨到一大群人身上。但是對38具骷髏的DNA分析完全改變了這個說法的思路。

The remains appear to come from distinct groups of people from as far as the Mediterranean, and they arrived at the lake several times over a 1,000-year span.

這些遺骸似乎來自不同的人群，最遠的來自地中海。他們在1000年的時間里分幾次到達了這個湖。

"Through the use of biomolecular analyses, such as ancient DNA, stable isotope dietary reconstruction, and radiocarbon dating, we discovered that the history of Roopkund Lake is more complex than we ever anticipated," said geneticist David Reich of Harvard Medical School.

“通過使用生物分子分析，比如遠古DNA、穩(wěn)定同位素膳食重建以及放射性碳定年法，我們發(fā)現(xiàn)路普康湖的歷史比我們預料的更為復雜。“哈佛醫(yī)學院的基因?qū)W家大衛(wèi)·賴希說道。

The story began to unfold a decade ago. Geneticist Kumarasamy Thangaraj of India's CSIR Centre for Cellular and Molecular Biology sequenced the mitochondrial DNA of 72 of the skeletons.

十年前，這個故事開始展開。印度科學與工業(yè)研究委員會細胞與分子生物中心的基因?qū)W家Kumarasamy Thangaraj，對72具骨骼的線粒體dna進行了測序。

As Thangaraj and his late colleague Lalji Singh had expected, some of the skeletons had DNA consistent with a local Indian origin.

正如Thangaraj和他已故的同事Lalji Singh預料的那樣，有些骷髏的DNA與當?shù)赜《纫嵋恢隆?/p>

But some did not. Several skeletons appeared to have originated around West Eurasia.

但有些不是。有幾具骷髏似乎是來源于西歐亞大陸。

This analysis revealed three distinct groups. The largest consisted of 23 individuals with DNA similar to that of people from present-day India. Apart from this, they seemed genetically unrelated.

這項分析揭露了三個不同的群。最大的一組由23個人組成，他們的DNA與當今印度的人相似。除此之外，他們在基因上似乎毫無聯(lián)系。

The second-largest group, comprising 14 individuals, was a huge surprise. Their DNA was most similar to people in present-day Crete and Greece.

第二大群體有14人，很令人驚訝。他們的DNA與現(xiàn)今克里特和希臘的人最為相似。

Finally, the one remaining individual had DNA suggesting a Southeast Asian origin.

最后，剩下的一個人的DNA表明他有東南亞血統(tǒng)。

Even more surprising was the staggered arrival times of the groups. Radiocarbon dating placed the Indian-related bones between the 7th and 10th centuries CE.

更令人驚訝的是，這群人的到達時間錯開了。放射性碳年代測定法將這些與印度有關的骨頭置于公元7世紀至10世紀之間。

It's possible they were divided into different groups at different times within this timespan.

有可能他們在這個時間期限內(nèi)，被劃分為不同時間的不同群組。

But the other two groups, from the Mediterranean and from Southeast Asia, were dated to between the 17th and 20th centuries CE.

但是另外兩個群組，來自地中海和東南亞，可以追溯到公元17世紀到20世紀之間。

That's just a few hundred years ago. And it's possible that the remains that haven't been tested could include other groups, from other times and other regions.

那只是幾百年前的事。還有一種可能是，沒有經(jīng)過測試的遺骸，可能包括來自其他時代和其他地區(qū)的其他族群。