@article {333773, title = {Genetic diversity of late Neanderthals in northwestern Europe}, journal = {Nature}, year = {2026}, month = {2026/06/24}, abstract = {

Archaeological, osteological and genetic evidence suggests that Neanderthals lived in small groups1,2; however, less is known about whether these groups were part of isolated communities or belonged to larger, well-connected populations3. The dense concentration of broadly contemporaneous Neanderthal sites in the Meuse Basin, Belgium4, provides a rare opportunity to study regional populations at high resolution. Here we generated genetic data from 27 Neanderthals who lived less than approximately 52,500\ years ago from ten archaeological sites in Belgium and France, including a high-coverage genome from a 45,000-year-old individual from Goyet, Belgium. We show that most of these individuals are more closely related to one another than to other contemporaneous late Neanderthals in Europe. Further, some of these individuals carry DNA from a Neanderthal lineage predating the split of late Neanderthals. Although these Neanderthals overlapped temporally with early modern humans in northwestern Europe from around 47,000\ years ago, we find no evidence of recent gene flow from modern humans. They also do not show the genetic signatures of mating among close relatives found in Altai Neanderthals, suggesting that they lived in larger or better-connected groups. Moreover, genetic load did not accumulate over time, arguing against progressive genetic deterioration as a driver of Neanderthal extinction.

}, isbn = {0028-08361476-4687}, doi = {http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/s41586-026-10625-1}, url = {https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-026-10625-1}, author = {Bossoms Mesa, Alba and Essel, Elena and Peyr{\'e}gne, St{\'e}phane and S{\"u}mer, Arev P. and Iasi, Leonardo N. M. and Heide, Christian and Popli, Divyaratan and de Filippo, Cesare and Gansauge, Marie-Theres and Gerullat, Lars and Lippik, Laurin and Nagel, Sarah and Nickel, Birgit and Schellbach, Barbara and Schmidt, Anna and Visagie, Johann and Weihmann, Antje and Zeberg, Hugo and Zorn, Julia and Rougier, H{\'e}l{\`e}ne and Crevecoeur, Isabelle and Semal, Patrick and Abrams, Gr{\'e}gory and Devi{\`e}se, Thibaut and Pirson, St{\'e}phane and Di Modica, K{\'e}vin and Cattelain, Pierre and Draily, Christelle and Toussaint, Michel and De Groote, Isabelle and Welker, Frido and Posth, Cosimo and Soressi, Marie and Hublin, Jean-Jacques and Krause, Johannes and P{\"a}{\"a}bo, Svante and Meyer, Matthias and Kelso, Janet and Peter, Benjamin M. and Hajdinjak, Mateja} }