ZooMS changes this equation. The collagen fingerprinting approach is relatively inexpensive, can be performed on very small samples, requires minimal preparation, and produces results quickly. A researcher can screen dozens of fragments per day, generating collagen profiles that identify the species family for each one. Hominin fragments—which have a distinct collagen signature distinguishable from the mammals most commonly found at Paleolithic sites—can be identified without requiring anatomical expertise in hominin morphology.
Since the Denisova Cave screening that found Denisova 11, ZooMS has been applied to collections from other European and Asian Paleolithic sites. At several sites, hominin fragments have been identified in material that had not previously yielded any recognized hominin remains. At Les Cottés in France, ZooMS identified a Neanderthal finger bone in a collection of bones previously thought to contain no hominin material. At Bacho Kiro cave in Bulgaria, ZooMS helped identify early modern human remains from a critical period of the modern human dispersal into Europe.
The ZooMS approach does not always yield DNA-quality material—many bones identified as hominin by collagen analysis do not yield usable ancient DNA, either because conditions at the site were not favorable for DNA preservation or because the particular sample is too degraded. But even a collagen identification is informative: it establishes that a hominin was present, that a bone was deposited, and that the site warrants further investigation. And in cases where DNA preservation is good enough—as it was in the Denisova 11 fragment—ZooMS-based screening can identify material that would otherwise never have been analyzed.