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- 🐶 Dogs Have Been "Man's Best Friend" for How Long?!
🐶 Dogs Have Been "Man's Best Friend" for How Long?!
Scientists have answers, and we're talking thousands of years, folks.
Chris Equale
February 20, 2025
Scientists uncover how long dogs have been “man’s best friend”.
Just like fish and chips, Batman and Robin or Jack and Jill, man and dog are a pair meant to be together. But how long has this dynamic duo been going? Scientists might finally know exactly when this friendship started.
It's all thanks to a new study led by a University of Arizona researcher who looked at archaeological remains from Alaska. Through this, scientists identified that people and the ancestors of today’s dogs began their close relationship as early as 12,000 years ago.
"We now have evidence that canines and people had close relationships earlier than we knew they did in the Americas," said lead study author François Lanoë, an assistant research professor at the University of Arizona School of Anthropology.
"People who are interested in the origins of the Americas want to know if those first Americans came with dogs. Until you find those animals in archaeological sites, we can speculate about it, but it's hard to prove one way or another. So, this is a significant contribution."
In a 2018 archaeological study, the same scientists discovered a lower-leg bone of an adult canine at a site in Alaska. Radiocarbon dating showed that the canine was alive 12,000 years ago, near the end of the Ice Age.
More recently, another excavation by the same team in June 2023 unearthed an 8,100-year-old canine jawbone at a nearby site. They believe this also showed signs of possible domestication.
The clearest sign came from chemical analysis of the bones. Through these tests, the team identified salmon proteins, suggesting the canine had regularly eaten fish. This was not typical of canines of the time as they hunted land animals exclusively, hinting at human interference.
While the team is confident that this is the earliest known relationship between humans and dogs, it is too early to know for sure. This is due to one key sticking point: "The existential question, what is a dog?", said co-author Ben Potter, an archaeologist with the University of Alaska Fairbanks.
The specimens may be too old to be genetically related to more recent dog populations that we might know. They acted and looked like dogs, but genetically, they are different. The researchers note that it could be tamed wolves, rather than fully domesticated dogs.
Here's hoping they're not barking up the wrong evolutionary tree.
Robotics student creates 3D-printed prosthetic leg for shelter dog.
It wasn’t a far-fetched concept after all.
A Long Island high-school whiz is helping a three-legged shelter dog find her forever home — by creating a prosthetic leg that will let the dog live a normal life.
Southampton High School robotics club leader Sarah Barros, 16, was so driven to help Tryla, a friendly pitbull mix, get adopted more easily that she even raised the money to produce the 3D-printed limb herself.
“I feel like a lot of the reason she’s not adopted is because people see too much management, too much hassle,” Sarah said. “I don’t think that’s fair because she is who she is — and she can’t change that. So anything I can do to change that, I am happy to.”
Tryla, 6, is believed to have lost her leg after being hit by a car as a much younger pup. She was brought to the Southampton Animal Shelter Foundation two years ago by an owner who could no longer care for her.
As time passed without her being adopted, a volunteer at the Hampton Bays facility had a game-changing idea in November.
“I remember seeing a video of high-school students in Arkansas creating a prosthetic foot for a duck,” said the volunteer, Susan Denis. “I thought we could do that here, and I reached out to the high school right away.”
With the help of a classmate, dog-loving Sarah — who excels in science, technology, engineering and mathematics classes — couldn’t wait to get started, even though it initially meant going above and beyond outside the lab.
“We don’t have a lot of money to be spending on projects,” she said of the school’s robotics club, which was founded last year.
“We sent out emails to everyone, parents, went around after school talking to all the teachers, we went to town a few times and talked to some store owners,” said Sarah, who made pamphlets to sway local investors.
The club successfully raised $300 for materials including resin and thermoplastics to 3D print Tryla a new front leg at the school. All that remained was Sarah taking measurements from the pooch’s other paw and the circumference of her nub during three visits to the shelter.
Of course, getting the dog to remain still for that took some effort.
“You have to sit with her for a while — you have to give it a good hour, give her a few treats,” Sarah said of the energetic and positive pooch.
This week, Tryla’s device was freshly molded and fitted onto her for the first time. More than anything else, it has given the cheerful dog a new opportunity to be taken home, Sarah said.
Sarah said she will be able write about being able to make such a positive change in her upcoming college essay now.
“She was really inspirational to me,” Sarah said of Tryla. “I think the impact that both the community and STEM have for something both so simple and very big is crazy.”
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