| a laboratory colony of the polynesian rat, rattus exulans. | | 1970 | 5425658 |
| dating the late prehistoric dispersal of polynesians to new zealand using the commensal pacific rat. | the pristine island ecosystems of east polynesia were among the last places on earth settled by prehistoric people, and their colonization triggered a devastating transformation. overhunting contributed to widespread faunal extinctions and the decline of marine megafauna, fires destroyed lowland forests, and the introduction of the omnivorous pacific rat (rattus exulans) led to a new wave of predation on the biota. east polynesian islands preserve exceptionally detailed records of the initial pr ... | 2008 | 18523023 |
| ancient dna from polynesian rats: extraction, amplification and sequence from single small bones. | the human colonisation of polynesia was a major event in world prehistory. it represents one of the last human population migrations, and one which required crossing major water barriers. though the subject of pacific population origins has been approached by scholars from numerous fields for nearly a century, recent years have seen the problem addressed by human geneticists. since the initial report describing the recovery of dna from skeletal remains, ancient dna studies have also focused on t ... | 1997 | 9378117 |
| patterns of prehistoric human mobility in polynesia indicated by mtdna from the pacific rat. | human settlement of polynesia was a major event in world prehistory. despite the vastness of the distances covered, research suggests that prehistoric polynesian populations maintained spheres of continuing interaction for at least some period of time in some regions. a low level of genetic variation in ancestral polynesian populations, genetic admixture (both prehistoric and post-european contact), and severe population crashes resulting from introduction of european diseases make it difficult ... | 1998 | 9844030 |