Initial – Saanvi News

Support for the DNS-over-HTTPS protocol has landed this week in Windows Insiders, Microsoft’s experimental version of Windows, where the company tests new features before making them broadly available.

Current Windows 10 Insiders Fast Ring distributions now include a DNS-over-HTTPS (DoH) client.

When activated, this new DoH client will allow the Windows OS to use the DoH protocol instead of classic DNS when connecting to the internet and when resolving web domains.

Work on adding a DoH client in Windows 10 began last year, in November.

Microsoft was responding to a rise in public interest in using DoH instead of DNS. At the time, browsers like Chrome and Firefox had shipped support for DoH.

However, from a software architectural perspective, Mozilla and Google’s DoH rollout were criticized by many engineers and system administrators.

Ever since the early days of operating system design, the OS has been in charge of DNS settings for all apps. By adding DoH support in browsers, Mozilla and Google took this control out of the operating system’s capabilities and, inherently, created problems for enterprise system administrators.

By developing a DoH client, Microsoft is bringing this control at the OS level again. This move benefits both system administrators of large corporate networks, but also home consumers, who will be able to benefit from DoH’s increased privacy even for apps that don’t natively support DoH (as Chrome and Firefox do now).

The DoH protocol is currently being viewed as a win for user privacy. The protocol works by taking a regular DNS request to resolve a web domain but hiding it.

Instead of sending the request in cleartext to a DNS server over port 53, DoH takes the request, encrypts it, and sends it as regular HTTPS traffic via port 443. In other words, DoH effectively hides DNS inside regular HTTPS traffic.

DNS servers that can process DoH traffic are called DoH resolvers. A DoH resolver has an open interface that listens for incoming HTTPS traffic, decrypts the request, resolves against the normal DNS name server systems, and returns the result to the user via the same HTTPS route, hence the name DNS-over-HTTPS.

Last year, Microsoft said that its end goal for the Windows DoH client is to migrate users from DNS to DoH without the user having to change any of their DNS settings. This would be done by having Windows automatically detect if a user’s locally-set DNS servers have an alternative DoH interface.

If the DoH client is enabled, Windows will use the DoH interface and fall back to classic DNS when DoH interfaces aren’t available or responding.

The Windows DoH client that shipped this week with Windows 10 Insiders Fast Ring builds supports only three DoH resolvers at the moment (Cloudflare, Google, Quad9), but this is only for the testing phase, and eventually, this will work seamlessly once it reaches the Windows stable release.

Fast Ring users willing to give the DoH client a go can find instructions on how to enable the client on this page.

Initial Upper Palaeolithic Homo sapiens from Bacho Kiro Cave, Bulgaria – Nature.com

Abstract

The Middle to Upper Palaeolithic transition in Europe witnessed the replacement and partial absorption of local Neanderthal populations by Homo sapiens populations of African origin¹. However, this process probably varied across regions and its details remain largely unknown. In particular, the duration of chronological overlap between the two groups is much debated, as are the implications of this overlap for the nature of the biological and cultural interactions between Neanderthals and H. sapiens. Here we report the discovery and direct dating of human remains found in association with Initial Upper Palaeolithic artefacts², from excavations at Bacho Kiro Cave (Bulgaria). Morphological analysis of a tooth and mitochondrial DNA from several hominin bone fragments, identified through proteomic screening, assign these finds to H. sapiens and link the expansion of Initial Upper Palaeolithic technologies with the spread of H. sapiens into the mid-latitudes of Eurasia before 45 thousand years ago³. The excavations yielded a wealth of bone artefacts, including pendants manufactured from cave bear teeth that are reminiscent of those later produced by the last Neanderthals of western Europe^4,5,6. These finds are consistent with models based on the arrival of multiple waves of H. sapiens into Europe coming into contact with declining Neanderthal populations^7,8.

Data availability

The data that support the findings of this study are available from the corresponding author upon reasonable request. Genetic sequence reads from all libraries and corresponding negative controls are deposited at European Nucleotide Archive under the study accession number PRJEB35466. The FASTA files of the mitochondrial genomes are deposited in GenBank with the accession numbers MN706602–MN706607. Details are as follows: Bacho Kiro AA7-738, MN706602; Bacho Kiro BB7-240, MN706603; Bacho Kiro BK-1653, MN706604; Bacho Kiro CC7-335, MN706605; Bacho Kiro CC7-2289, MN706606; and Bacho Kiro molar F6-620, MN706607.

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Acknowledgements

We thank the tourism association of Bacho Kiro Cave in the town of Dryanovo, the History museum – Dryanovo, the Regional History museum in the city of Gabrovo, Dryanovo town hall and V. Lafchiiski for their assistance with the fieldwork and in the laboratory; N. Spassov from the National Museum of Natural History in Sofia for cooperating and hosting researchers of our project; H. Temming and J. Honeyford for their technical assistance and S. Nagel, B. Nickel, B. Schellbach and A. Weihmann for their help with the ancient DNA laboratory procedures and sequencing. Field operations were funded by the Max Planck Society. AixMICADAS and its operation are funded by Collège de France and the EQUIPEX ASTER-CEREGE (principal investigator, E.B.). S.T. is funded by the European Research Council under the European Union’s Horizon 2020 Research and Innovation Programme (grant agreement no. 803147-951 RESOLUTION). The ancient DNA part of this study was funded by the Max Planck Society and the European Research Council (grant agreement no. 694707 to S.P.).

Author information

Affiliations

Department of Human Evolution, Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Leipzig, Germany
- Jean-Jacques Hublin
- , Shara Bailey
- , Helen Fewlass
- , Bernd Kromer
- , Virginie Sinet-Mathiot
- , Zeljko Rezek
- , Matthew M. Skinner
- , Geoff M. Smith
- , Sahra Talamo
- , Frido Welker
- , Shannon P. McPherron
- & Tsenka Tsanova
Chaire Internationale de Paléoanthropologie, Collège de France, Paris, France
- Jean-Jacques Hublin
National Institute of Archaeology with Museum, Bulgarian Academy of Sciences, Sofia, Bulgaria
- Nikolay Sirakov
- & Svoboda Sirakova
Interdisciplinary Centre for Archaeology and the Evolution of Human Behaviour, Universidade do Algarve, Faro, Portugal
- Vera Aldeias
- & João Marreiros
Department of Anthropology, New York University, New York, NY, USA
- Shara Bailey
CEREGE, Aix Marseille University, CNRS, IRD, INRAE, Collège de France, Aix-en-Provence, France
- Edouard Bard
- , Yoann Fagault
- & Thibaut Tuna
Service de Préhistoire, University of Liège, Liège, Belgium
- Vincent Delvigne
CNRS, UMR 5199 PACEA, University of Bordeaux, Pessac, France
- Vincent Delvigne
National History Museum, Sofia, Bulgaria
- Elena Endarova
Department of Evolutionary Genetics, Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Leipzig, Germany
- Mateja Hajdinjak
- , Matthias Meyer
- & Svante Pääbo
History Museum, Belogradchik, Bulgaria
- Ivaylo Krumov
TraCEr, Monrepos Archaeological Research Centre and Museum for Human Behavioural Evolution, RGZM, Mainz, Germany
- João Marreiros
Department of Anthropology, University of California, Davis, Davis, CA, USA
- Naomi L. Martisius
Department of Archaeology, University of Aberdeen, Aberdeen, UK
- Lindsey Paskulin
Institute of Biodiversity and Ecosystem Research, Bulgarian Academy of Sciences, Sofia, Bulgaria
- Vasil Popov
University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology, Philadelphia, PA, USA
- Zeljko Rezek
School of Anthropology and Conservation, University of Kent, Canterbury, UK
- Matthew M. Skinner
Archaeology Department, New Bulgarian University, Sofia, Bulgaria
- Rosen Spasov
Department of Chemistry ‘G. Ciamician’, University of Bologna, Bologna, Italy
- Sahra Talamo
Department of Earth Sciences, ETH Zurich, Zurich, Switzerland
- Lukas Wacker
Evolutionary Genomics Section, Globe Institute, University of Copenhagen, Copenhagen, Denmark
- Frido Welker
Department of Cell Therapy, Fraunhofer Institute for Cell Therapy and Immunology, Leipzig, Germany
- Arndt Wilcke
Archaeology Department, New Bulgarian University, Sofia, Bulgaria
- Nikolay Zahariev

Authors

Jean-Jacques Hublin

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Nikolay Sirakov

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Vera Aldeias

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Shara Bailey

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Edouard Bard

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Helen Fewlass

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Bernd Kromer

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Virginie Sinet-Mathiot

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Matthias Meyer

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Shannon P. McPherron

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Tsenka Tsanova

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Contributions

J.-J.H. designed the study. T. Tsanova, N.S., V.A., S.S., R.S., E.E., Z.R. and S.P.M. collected field data; H.F., B.K., L.W., E.B., Y.F., T. Tuna and S.T. established the radiocarbon dates; V.A. studied the micromorphology of the sediments; S.B., M.M.S. and J.-J.H. analysed hominin dental morphology; V.S.-M., L.P., F.W. and A.W. performed ZooMS; M.H., M.M. and S.P. performed mtDNA analysis; T. Tsanova, N.S., N.Z., S.S., I.K., V.D., J.M. and S.P.M. conducted the study of the lithics; G.M.S., R.S., V.P. and N.L.M. analysed the faunal assemblages and the osseous objects. J.-J.H. wrote the paper with contributions of all authors.

Corresponding author

Correspondence to
Jean-Jacques Hublin.

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The authors declare no competing interests.

Additional information

Peer review information Nature thanks William Banks, Richard G. Klein and the other, anonymous, reviewer(s) for their contribution to the peer review of this work.

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Extended data figures and tables

Extended Data Fig. 1 Excavations at Bacho Kiro Cave, 2015–2018.

a, Plan view of the entrance and the excavated areas of the cave, with the grid system of our recent excavations (letters in the left column) and those of the 1971–1975 excavations (letters in the right column). b, Site location in southeastern Europe. c, Photograph of the entrance of the cave. The floor is artificially raised; the original entrance was several metres lower than shown in this photograph. d, Initial stratigraphic section drawing of the exposed profile from the Main sector in 2015 (codes for the archaeological layers are on the left, with the corresponding layers from the 1971–1975 excavations in parentheses). e, Frontal view of the Niche 1 sector and its stratigraphic subdivisions. f, Lower part of the stratigraphic section drawing of the Niche 1 sector, in 2018. Note the thickness and preservation of the lower deposits here in comparison with the Main sector profile. g, Photograph of the Main sector transversal section on the line between squares F5–F6 and squares G5–G6 before excavation in 2015. CF, combustion feature. h–n, Hominin remains identified by ZooMS with their IDs: BK-1653 (h) and F6-597 (j) from layer B, with h coming from the 1971–1975 excavations (dashed line); BB7-240 (k), CC7-2289 (l), CC7-335 (m) and AA7-738 (n) from layer N1-I. Continuous lines connect the fossils with their find locations. i, Second lower molar (F6-620) from layer J in the Main sector.

Extended Data Fig. 2 Geographical distributions.

Geographical distribution of the main IUP sites of western and central Eurasia (black dots), directly dated early H. sapiens predating 37,000 cal. bp (empty black dots) and directly dated late Neanderthals associated with Châtelperronian assemblages (orange squares). Bacho Kiro Cave is represented by a red circle.

Extended Data Fig. 3 Photographs of lithic artefacts from layer I of Bacho Kiro Cave.

Pointed retouched blades and fragments (1–4, 6, 7) and piece with bifacial retouch (5). Photographs by V.S.-M. and T. Tsanova.

Extended Data Fig. 4 Drawings of lithic artefacts from layer I of Bacho Kiro Cave.

Pointed retouched blade with slightly oblique truncation and base modified by inverse retouch (1), pointed blade fragments (2 and 5, which has an oblique truncation and slight notch on the left edge, and was perhaps intentionally fragmented), pointed, small blades fragments (3, 7, 8 and 9), pointed blade fragment with opposing pseudo-burin blows on the apex and on the distal fracture edge (perhaps indicating use as a projectile) (4) and Levallois flake (6). Drawings by I.K. and T. Tsanova).

Extended Data Fig. 5 Human lower second molar (F6-620).

a, Mesial, buccal and distal views of the crown, root and pulp chamber (left) and occlusal views of the enamel and dentine crown (right). b, A principal component analysis of the shape of the enamel–dentine junction ridge and cervix places the Bacho Kiro Cave second lower molar (F6-620) represented by a red star within the samples of recent (n = 8) and Pleistocene (n = 9) H. sapiens, and outside the distribution of Neanderthals (n = 20) and H. erectus (n = 3).

Extended Data Fig. 6 MALDI–TOF MS spectra for the six bone specimens identified as hominins through ZooMS analysis.

a, B4-1653 (interface of layers 6a and 7). b, AA7-738 (layer N1-I). c, BB7-240 (layer N1-I). d, CC7-2289 (layer N1-I). e, CC7-335 (layer N1-I). f, F6-597 (layer B).

Extended Data Fig. 7 Frequency of nucleotide substitutions at the beginning and the ends of mtDNA alignments for the Bacho Kiro Cave specimens.

Only fragments of at least 35 base pairs in length that mapped to the revised Cambridge Reference Sequence with a mapping quality of at least 25 were used for this analysis. Solid lines in red depict all fragments and dashed lines depict the fragments that have a C-to-T substitution at the opposing end (‘conditional’ C-to-T substitutions). All other types of substitution are marked in grey.

Extended Data Fig. 8 Bayesian phylogenetic tree relating Bacho Kiro Cave mtDNA to 54 present-day humans, 10 directly radiocarbon dated ancient H. sapiens and the Vindija 33.16 Neanderthal.

The Bacho Kiro Cave specimens are in red. Other ancient H. sapiens used as calibration points to estimate the tip dates of Bacho Kiro Cave specimens are italicized. The posterior probabilities are denoted above the branches. The mtDNA of Vindija 33.16 was used to root the tree (not shown).

Extended Data Table 1 Comparative dental metrics

Extended Data Table 2 mtDNA branch-shortening estimates

Supplementary information

Supplementary Information

This file contains Supplementary Discussion sections 1-7 with Supplementary Figures 1-10, Supplementary Tables 1-16 and additional references.

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Hublin, J., Sirakov, N., Aldeias, V. et al. Initial Upper Palaeolithic Homo sapiens from Bacho Kiro Cave, Bulgaria.
Nature (2020). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41586-020-2259-z

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Received: 30 July 2019
Accepted: 24 February 2020
Published: 11 May 2020
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41586-020-2259-z

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