scholarly journals The genomic landscape of contemporary western Remote Oceanians

2022 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lara R. Arauna ◽  
Jacob Bergstedt ◽  
Jeremy Choin ◽  
Javier Mendoza-Revilla ◽  
Christine Harmant ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
East Asian ◽  
Genomic Diversity ◽  
Sociocultural Factors ◽  
Genome Wide ◽  
Genomic Landscape ◽  
Population Turnover ◽  
Genome Wide Data ◽  
History Of ◽  
Source Populations ◽  
Sociocultural Processes

The Vanuatu archipelago served as a gateway to Remote Oceania during one of the most extensive human migrations to uninhabited lands around 3,200 years ago. Ancient DNA studies suggest an initial settlement by East Asian-related peoples that was quickly followed by the arrival of Papuan-related populations, leading to a major population turnover. Yet, there is uncertainty over the population processes and the sociocultural factors that have shaped the genomic diversity of ni-Vanuatu, who present nowadays among the world's highest linguistic and cultural diversity. Here, we report genome-wide data for 1,433 contemporary ni-Vanuatu from 29 different islands, including 287 couples. We find that ni-Vanuatu derive their East Asian- and Papuan-related ancestry from the same source populations and descend from relatively synchronous admixture events that occurred around 1,700-2,300 years ago, indicating a peopling history common to all the archipelago. However, our analyses reveal that the Papuan population turnover was geographically uneven, and that the genetic contribution of Papuan-related peoples was male-biased. Furthermore, we detect Polynesian ancestry arriving around 600-1,000 years ago to South Vanuatu, and map its distribution to both Polynesian- and non-Polynesian-speaking islands. Lastly, we provide evidence for a tendency of spouses to carry similar genetic ancestry, when accounting for relatedness avoidance. The signal is not driven by strong genetic effects of specific loci or trait-associated variants, suggesting that it results instead from social assortative mating. Altogether, our findings provide insight into both the genetic history of ni-Vanuatu populations and how sociocultural processes have shaped the diversity of their genomes.

scholarly journals Genomic landscape of human diversity across Madagascar

2017 ◽  
Vol 114 (32) ◽  
pp. E6498-E6506 ◽  
Author(s):  
Denis Pierron ◽  
Margit Heiske ◽  
Harilanto Razafindrazaka ◽  
Ignace Rakoto ◽  
Nelly Rabetokotany ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Genomic Diversity ◽  
Eastern Africa ◽  
Human Populations ◽  
Human Diversity ◽  
Genetic Traits ◽  
Paternal Contribution ◽  
Genome Wide ◽  
Genomic Landscape ◽  
Genome Wide Data ◽  
Admixed Population

Although situated ∼400 km from the east coast of Africa, Madagascar exhibits cultural, linguistic, and genetic traits from both Southeast Asia and Eastern Africa. The settlement history remains contentious; we therefore used a grid-based approach to sample at high resolution the genomic diversity (including maternal lineages, paternal lineages, and genome-wide data) across 257 villages and 2,704 Malagasy individuals. We find a common Bantu and Austronesian descent for all Malagasy individuals with a limited paternal contribution from Europe and the Middle East. Admixture and demographic growth happened recently, suggesting a rapid settlement of Madagascar during the last millennium. However, the distribution of African and Asian ancestry across the island reveals that the admixture was sex biased and happened heterogeneously across Madagascar, suggesting independent colonization of Madagascar from Africa and Asia rather than settlement by an already admixed population. In addition, there are geographic influences on the present genomic diversity, independent of the admixture, showing that a few centuries is sufficient to produce detectable genetic structure in human populations.

scholarly journals Ancient genomic time transect from the Central Asian Steppe unravels the history of the Scythians

2021 ◽  
Vol 7 (13) ◽  
pp. eabe4414
Author(s):  
Guido Alberto Gnecchi-Ruscone ◽  
Elmira Khussainova ◽  
Nurzhibek Kahbatkyzy ◽  
Lyazzat Musralina ◽  
Maria A. Spyrou ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Bronze Age ◽  
Iron Age ◽  
Gene Pools ◽  
Social Rules ◽  
Eurasian Steppe ◽  
Central Asian ◽  
Genome Wide ◽  
Genome Wide Data ◽  
History Of ◽  
First Millennium

The Scythians were a multitude of horse-warrior nomad cultures dwelling in the Eurasian steppe during the first millennium BCE. Because of the lack of first-hand written records, little is known about the origins and relations among the different cultures. To address these questions, we produced genome-wide data for 111 ancient individuals retrieved from 39 archaeological sites from the first millennia BCE and CE across the Central Asian Steppe. We uncovered major admixture events in the Late Bronze Age forming the genetic substratum for two main Iron Age gene-pools emerging around the Altai and the Urals respectively. Their demise was mirrored by new genetic turnovers, linked to the spread of the eastern nomad empires in the first centuries CE. Compared to the high genetic heterogeneity of the past, the homogenization of the present-day Kazakhs gene pool is notable, likely a result of 400 years of strict exogamous social rules.

scholarly journals Genetic legacy of state centralization in the Kuba Kingdom of the Democratic Republic of the Congo

2018 ◽  
Vol 116 (2) ◽  
pp. 593-598 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lucy van Dorp ◽  
Sara Lowes ◽  
Jonathan L. Weigel ◽  
Naser Ansari-Pour ◽  
Saioa López ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Large Scale ◽  
Democratic Republic ◽  
Central Province ◽  
Genome Wide ◽  
Genetic Patterns ◽  
Genetic Impact ◽  
Genome Wide Data ◽  
Republic Of The Congo ◽  
History Of ◽  
State Centralization

Few phenomena have had as profound or long-lasting consequences in human history as the emergence of large-scale centralized states in the place of smaller scale and more local societies. This study examines a fundamental, and yet unexplored, consequence of state formation: its genetic legacy. We studied the genetic impact of state centralization during the formation of the eminent precolonial Kuba Kingdom of the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) in the 17th century. We analyzed genome-wide data from over 690 individuals sampled from 27 different ethnic groups from the Kasai Central Province of the DRC. By comparing genetic patterns in the present-day Kuba, whose ancestors were part of the Kuba Kingdom, with those in neighboring non-Kuba groups, we show that the Kuba today are more genetically diverse and more similar to other groups in the region than expected, consistent with the historical unification of distinct subgroups during state centralization. We also found evidence of genetic mixing dating to the time of the Kingdom at its most prominent. Using this unique dataset, we characterize the genetic history of the Kasai Central Province and describe the historic late wave of migrations into the region that contributed to a Bantu-like ancestry component found across large parts of Africa today. Taken together, we show the power of genetics to evidence events of sociopolitical importance and highlight how DNA can be used to better understand the behaviors of both people and institutions in the past.

scholarly journals The genomic history of the Iberian Peninsula over the past 8000 years

Science ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 363 (6432) ◽  
pp. 1230-1234 ◽  
Author(s):  
Iñigo Olalde ◽  
Swapan Mallick ◽  
Nick Patterson ◽  
Nadin Rohland ◽  
Vanessa Villalba-Mouco ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Iberian Peninsula ◽  
Iron Age ◽  
North Africa ◽  
Eastern Mediterranean ◽  
Hunter Gatherers ◽  
Y Chromosomes ◽  
Genome Wide ◽  
Genome Wide Data ◽  
History Of ◽  
Genetic Substructure

We assembled genome-wide data from 271 ancient Iberians, of whom 176 are from the largely unsampled period after 2000 BCE, thereby providing a high-resolution time transect of the Iberian Peninsula. We document high genetic substructure between northwestern and southeastern hunter-gatherers before the spread of farming. We reveal sporadic contacts between Iberia and North Africa by ~2500 BCE and, by ~2000 BCE, the replacement of 40% of Iberia’s ancestry and nearly 100% of its Y-chromosomes by people with Steppe ancestry. We show that, in the Iron Age, Steppe ancestry had spread not only into Indo-European–speaking regions but also into non-Indo-European–speaking ones, and we reveal that present-day Basques are best described as a typical Iron Age population without the admixture events that later affected the rest of Iberia. Additionally, we document how, beginning at least in the Roman period, the ancestry of the peninsula was transformed by gene flow from North Africa and the eastern Mediterranean.

scholarly journals On the origin of mongrels: evolutionary history of free-breeding dogs in Eurasia

2015 ◽  
Vol 282 (1820) ◽  
pp. 20152189 ◽  
Author(s):  
Małgorzata Pilot ◽  
Tadeusz Malewski ◽  
Andre E. Moura ◽  
Tomasz Grzybowski ◽  
Kamil Oleński ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
East Asian ◽  
Domestic Dog ◽  
Indigenous Status ◽  
Westward Expansion ◽  
Pure Breed ◽  
Archaeological Data ◽  
Genome Wide ◽  
History Of ◽  
Western Eurasia ◽  
Free Ranging

Although a large part of the global domestic dog population is free-ranging and free-breeding, knowledge of genetic diversity in these free-breeding dogs (FBDs) and their ancestry relations to pure-breed dogs is limited, and the indigenous status of FBDs in Asia is still uncertain. We analyse genome-wide SNP variability of FBDs across Eurasia, and show that they display weak genetic structure and are genetically distinct from pure-breed dogs rather than constituting an admixture of breeds. Our results suggest that modern European breeds originated locally from European FBDs. East Asian and Arctic breeds show closest affinity to East Asian FBDs, and they both represent the earliest branching lineages in the phylogeny of extant Eurasian dogs. Our biogeographic reconstruction of ancestral distributions indicates a gradual westward expansion of East Asian indigenous dogs to the Middle East and Europe through Central and West Asia, providing evidence for a major expansion that shaped the patterns of genetic differentiation in modern dogs. This expansion was probably secondary and could have led to the replacement of earlier resident populations in Western Eurasia. This could explain why earlier studies based on modern DNA suggest East Asia as the region of dog origin, while ancient DNA and archaeological data point to Western Eurasia.

scholarly journals Paleolithic DNA from the Caucasus reveals core of West Eurasian ancestry

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Iosif Lazaridis ◽  
Anna Belfer-Cohen ◽  
Swapan Mallick ◽  
Nick Patterson ◽  
Olivia Cheronet ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Near East ◽  
Great Majority ◽  
Ice Age ◽  
Western Anatolia ◽  
Hunter Gatherers ◽  
The Caucasus ◽  
Genome Wide ◽  
Population Turnover ◽  
Genome Wide Data ◽  
Relationship Of

AbstractThe earliest ancient DNA data of modern humans from Europe dates to ∼40 thousand years ago1-4, but that from the Caucasus and the Near East to only ∼14 thousand years ago5,6, from populations who lived long after the Last Glacial Maximum (LGM) ∼26.5-19 thousand years ago7. To address this imbalance and to better understand the relationship of Europeans and Near Easterners, we report genome-wide data from two ∼26 thousand year old individuals from Dzudzuana Cave in Georgia in the Caucasus from around the beginning of the LGM. Surprisingly, the Dzudzuana population was more closely related to early agriculturalists from western Anatolia ∼8 thousand years ago8 than to the hunter-gatherers of the Caucasus from the same region of western Georgia of ∼13-10 thousand years ago5. Most of the Dzudzuana population’s ancestry was deeply related to the post-glacial western European hunter-gatherers of the ‘Villabruna cluster’3, but it also had ancestry from a lineage that had separated from the great majority of non-African populations before they separated from each other, proving that such ‘Basal Eurasians’6,9 were present in West Eurasia twice as early as previously recorded5,6. We document major population turnover in the Near East after the time of Dzudzuana, showing that the highly differentiated Holocene populations of the region6 were formed by ‘Ancient North Eurasian’3,9,10 admixture into the Caucasus and Iran and North African11,12 admixture into the Natufians of the Levant. We finally show that the Dzudzuana population contributed the majority of the ancestry of post-Ice Age people in the Near East, North Africa, and even parts of Europe, thereby becoming the largest single contributor of ancestry of all present-day West Eurasians.

scholarly journals A dynamic 6,000-year genetic history of Eurasia’s Eastern Steppe

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Choongwon Jeong ◽  
Ke Wang ◽  
Shevan Wilkin ◽  
William Timothy Treal Taylor ◽  
Bryan K. Miller ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Bronze Age ◽  
Population History ◽  
Complex Interplay ◽  
Cultural Changes ◽  
Genetic History ◽  
Nomadic Pastoralists ◽  
Eurasian Steppe ◽  
Genome Wide ◽  
Genome Wide Data ◽  
History Of

SummaryThe Eastern Eurasian Steppe was home to historic empires of nomadic pastoralists, including the Xiongnu and the Mongols. However, little is known about the region’s population history. Here we reveal its dynamic genetic history by analyzing new genome-wide data for 214 ancient individuals spanning 6,000 years. We identify a pastoralist expansion into Mongolia ca. 3000 BCE, and by the Late Bronze Age, Mongolian populations were biogeographically structured into three distinct groups, all practicing dairy pastoralism regardless of ancestry. The Xiongnu emerged from the mixing of these populations and those from surrounding regions. By comparison, the Mongols exhibit much higher Eastern Eurasian ancestry, resembling present-day Mongolic-speaking populations. Our results illuminate the complex interplay between genetic, sociopolitical, and cultural changes on the Eastern Steppe.

scholarly journals Towards a new history and geography of human genes informed by ancient DNA

2014 ◽  
Author(s):  
Joseph Pickrell ◽  
David Reich
Keyword(s):  
Natural Selection ◽  
Ancient Dna ◽  
Population Replacement ◽  
Local Conditions ◽  
Geographic Locations ◽  
Technological Advances ◽  
Genome Wide ◽  
Human Genes ◽  
Genome Wide Data ◽  
History Of

Genetic information contains a record of the history of our species, and technological advances have transformed our ability to access this record. Many studies have used genome-wide data from populations today to learn about the peopling of the globe and subsequent adaptation to local conditions. Implicit in this research is the assumption that the geographic locations of people today are informative about the geographic locations of their ancestors in the distant past. However, it is now clear that long-range migration, admixture and population replacement have been the rule rather than the exception in human history. In light of this, we argue that it is time to critically re-evaluate current views of the peopling of the globe and the importance of natural selection in determining the geographic distribution of phenotypes. We specifically highlight the transformative potential of ancient DNA. By accessing the genetic make-up of populations living at archaeologically-known times and places, ancient DNA makes it possible to directly track migrations and responses to natural selection.

scholarly journals Killer whale genomes reveal a complex history of recurrent admixture and vicariance

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Andrew D. Foote ◽  
Michael D. Martin ◽  
Marie Louis ◽  
George Pacheco ◽  
Kelly M. Robertson ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Evolutionary History ◽  
Killer Whale ◽  
Natural Populations ◽  
Major Axis ◽  
Glacial Cycle ◽  
Genome Wide ◽  
Complex Population ◽  
Genome Wide Data ◽  
History Of ◽  
Global Population

AbstractReconstruction of the demographic and evolutionary history of populations assuming a consensus tree-like relationship can mask more complex scenarios, which are prevalent in nature. An emerging genomic toolset, which has been most comprehensively harnessed in the reconstruction of human evolutionary history, enables molecular ecologists to elucidate complex population histories. Killer whales have limited extrinsic barriers to dispersal and have radiated globally, and are therefore a good candidate model for the application of such tools. Here, we analyse a global dataset of killer whale genomes in a rare attempt to elucidate global population structure in a non-human species. We identify a pattern of genetic homogenisation at lower latitudes and the greatest differentiation at high latitudes, even between currently sympatric lineages. The processes underlying the major axis of structure include high drift at the edge of species’ range, likely associated with founder effects and allelic surfing during post-glacial range expansion. Divergence between Antarctic and non-Antarctic lineages is further driven by ancestry segments with up to four-fold older coalescence time than the genome-wide average; relicts of a previous vicariance during an earlier glacial cycle. Our study further underpins that episodic gene flow is ubiquitous in natural populations, and can occur across great distances and after substantial periods of isolation between populations. Thus, understanding the evolutionary history of a species requires comprehensive geographic sampling and genome-wide data to sample the variation in ancestry within individuals.

scholarly journals Extensive Ethnolinguistic Diversity in Vietnam Reflects Multiple Sources of Genetic Diversity

2020 ◽  
Vol 37 (9) ◽  
pp. 2503-2519 ◽  
Author(s):  
Dang Liu ◽  
Nguyen Thuy Duong ◽  
Nguyen Dang Ton ◽  
Nguyen Van Phong ◽  
Brigitte Pakendorf ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Genetic Diversity ◽  
Southeast Asia ◽  
Linguistic Diversity ◽  
Published Data ◽  
Multiple Sources ◽  
Austronesian Languages ◽  
Genome Wide ◽  
Genome Wide Data ◽  
History Of ◽  
Mainland Southeast Asia

Abstract Vietnam features extensive ethnolinguistic diversity and occupies a key position in Mainland Southeast Asia. Yet, the genetic diversity of Vietnam remains relatively unexplored, especially with genome-wide data, because previous studies have focused mainly on the majority Kinh group. Here, we analyze newly generated genome-wide single-nucleotide polymorphism data for the Kinh and 21 additional ethnic groups in Vietnam, encompassing all five major language families in Mainland Southeast Asia. In addition to analyzing the allele and haplotype sharing within the Vietnamese groups, we incorporate published data from both nearby modern populations and ancient samples for comparison. In contrast to previous studies that suggested a largely indigenous origin for Vietnamese genetic diversity, we find that Vietnamese ethnolinguistic groups harbor multiple sources of genetic diversity that likely reflect different sources for the ancestry associated with each language family. However, linguistic diversity does not completely match genetic diversity: There have been extensive interactions between the Hmong-Mien and Tai-Kadai groups; different Austro-Asiatic groups show different affinities with other ethnolinguistic groups; and we identified a likely case of cultural diffusion in which some Austro-Asiatic groups shifted to Austronesian languages during the past 2,500 years. Overall, our results highlight the importance of genome-wide data from dense sampling of ethnolinguistic groups in providing new insights into the genetic diversity and history of an ethnolinguistically diverse region, such as Vietnam.

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