From the Pampas to Patagonia, DNA reveals South America's human history

A new genetic study shows that cultural diversity in the so-called Southern Cone—the roughly triangular southernmost part of South America—was strongly influenced by extensive human migration. An international research team led by the Senckenberg Center for Human Evolution and Paleoenvironment at the University of Tübingen and involving several institutions in South America analyzed the genetic material of 52 Indigenous individuals who lived in the Pampas, northwestern Patagonia, the Paraná Delta, and the eastern lowlands of Uruguay over the past 6,000 years.