(Press-News.org) This news release is available in German.
When individuals from different groups interbreed, their offspring's DNA becomes a mixture of the DNA from each admixing group. Pieces of this DNA are then passed along through subsequent generations, carrying on all the way to the present day. Researchers from the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology in Leipzig, Germany, Oxford University and University College London (UCL) have now produced a global map detailing the genetic histories of 95 different populations across the world, spanning the last four millennia.
The interactive world map, that is accessible via the internet, details the histories of genetic mixing between each of the 95 populations across Europe, Africa, Asia and South America. It shows likely genetic impacts of historical events including European colonialism, the Mongol Empire, the Arab slave trade and European traders near the Silk Road mixing with people in China.
The study, published this week in Science, is the first to simultaneously identify, date and characterise genetic mixing between populations. To do this, the researchers developed sophisticated statistical methods to analyse the DNA of 1490 individuals in 95 populations around the world. "DNA really has the power to tell stories and uncover details of humanity's past", said Simon Myers of Oxford University's Department of Statistics and Wellcome Trust Centre for Human Genetics, co-senior author of the study. "Because our approach uses only genetic data, it provides information independent from other sources. Many of our genetic observations match historical events, and we also see evidence of previously unrecorded genetic mixing. For example, the DNA of the Tu people in modern China suggests that in around 1200CE, Europeans similar to modern Greeks mixed with an otherwise Chinese-like population. Plausibly, the source of this European-like DNA might be merchants travelling the nearby Silk Road."
The powerful technique, christened 'Globetrotter', provides insight into past events such as the genetic legacy of the Mongol Empire. Historical records suggest that the Hazara people of Pakistan are partially descended from Mongol warriors, and this study found clear evidence of Mongol DNA entering the population during the period of the Mongol Empire. Six other populations, from as far west as Turkey, showed similar evidence of genetic mixing with Mongols around the same time.
"What amazes me most is simply how well our technique works", said Garrett Hellenthal of the UCL Genetics Institute, lead author of the study. "Although individual mutations carry only weak signals about where a person is from, by adding information across the whole genome we can reconstruct these mixing events. Sometimes individuals sampled from nearby regions can have surprisingly different sources of mixing. For example, we identify distinct events happening at different times among groups other than the Hazara sampled within Pakistan, with some inheriting DNA from sub-Saharan Africa, perhaps related to the Arab Slave Trade, another from East Asia, and yet another from ancient Europe. Nearly all our populations show mixing events, so they are very common throughout recent history and often involve people migrating over large distances."
The team used genome data for all 1490 individuals to identify 'chunks' of DNA that were shared between individuals from different populations. Populations sharing more ancestry share more chunks, and individual chunks give clues about the underlying ancestry along chromosomes.
"Each population has a particular genetic 'palette'", said Daniel Falush of the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology in Leipzig, Germany, co-senior author of the study. "If you were to paint the genomes of people in modern-day Maya, for example, you would use a mixed palette with colours from Spanish-like, West African and Native American DNA. This mix dates back to around 1670AD, consistent with historical accounts describing Spanish and West African people entering the Americas around that time. Though we can't directly sample DNA from the groups that mixed in the past, we can capture much of the DNA of these original groups as persisting, within a mixed palette of modern-day groups."
As well as providing fresh insights into historical events, the new research might have implications for how DNA impacts health and disease in different populations.
INFORMATION:
Original publication:
Garrett Hellenthal, George B.J. Busby, Gavin Band, James F. Wilson, Cristian Capelli, Daniel Falush, Simon Myers
A Genetic Atlas of Human Admixture History
Science, 14 February 2014
Mixed genes
An interactive world map of human genetic history reveals likely genetic impacts of historical events
2014-02-14
ELSE PRESS RELEASES FROM THIS DATE:
Study highlights indigenous response to natural disaster
2014-02-14
DENVER (Feb. 13, 2014) – When a tsunami struck American Samoa in 2009, indigenous institutions on the islands provided effective disaster relief that could help federal emergency managers in similar communities nationwide, according to a study from the University of Colorado Denver and the University of Hawaii at Manoa.
The study found that following the tsunami, residents of the remote U.S. territory in the South Pacific relied on Fa'aSamoa or The Samoan Way, an umbrella term incorporating a variety of traditional institutions governing the lives of its citizens.
"We ...
Berkeley Lab researchers at AAAS 2014
2014-02-14
Can more accurate climate models help us understand extreme weather events? Can we use
synthetic biology to create better biofuels? These questions, and the ongoing search for Dark
Matter and better photovoltaic materials, are just some of the presentations by Lawrence
Berkeley National Lab researchers at this year's AAAS meeting. Here's a quick look at Berkeley
Lab@AAAS:
Friday, Feb. 14
1:00-2:30
Opportunities for New Materials in
Photovoltaics (Toronto Room, Hyatt Regency)
Ramamoorthy Ramesh
The
Department of Energy's ...
Superconductivity in orbit: Scientists find new path to loss-free electricity
2014-02-14
UPTON, NY—Armed with just the right atomic arrangements, superconductors allow electricity to flow without loss and radically enhance energy generation, delivery, and storage. Scientists tweak these superconductor recipes by swapping out elements or manipulating the valence electrons in an atom's outermost orbital shell to strike the perfect conductive balance. Most high-temperature superconductors contain atoms with only one orbital impacting performance—but what about mixing those elements with more complex configurations?
Now, researchers at the U.S. Department of ...
Rewriting the text books: Scientists crack open 'black box' of development
2014-02-14
We know much about how embryos develop, but one key stage – implantation – has remained a
mystery. Now, scientists from Cambridge have discovered a way to study and film this 'black box'
of development. Their results – which will lead to the rewriting of biology text books worldwide
– are published in the journal Cell. Embryo development in mammals occurs in two phases.
During the first phase, pre-implantation, the embryo is a small, free-floating ball of cells
called a blastocyst. In the second, post-implantation, phase the blastocyst embeds itself in the
mother's ...
A role of glucose tolerance could make the adaptor protein p66Shc a new target for cancer and diabetes
2014-02-14
[TORONTO,Canada, Feb 18, 2014] – A protein that has been known until recently as part of a complex communications network within the cell also plays a direct role in regulating sugar metabolism, according to a new study published on-line in the journal Science Signaling (February 18, 2014).
Cell growth and metabolism are tightly controlled processes in our cells. When these functions are disturbed, diseases such as cancer and diabetes occur. Mohamed Soliman, a PhD candidate at the Lunenfeld Tanenbaum Research Institute at Mount Sinai Hospital, found a unique role for ...
IBEX research shows influence of galactic magnetic field extends beyond our solar system
2014-02-14
In a report published today, new research suggests the enigmatic "ribbon" of energetic
particles discovered at the edge of our solar system by NASA's Interstellar Boundary Explorer (IBEX)
may be only a small sign of the vast influence of the galactic magnetic field.
IBEX researchers have sought answers about the ribbon since its discovery in 2009. Comprising
primarily space physicists, the IBEX team realized that the galactic magnetic field wrapped around
our heliosphere — the giant "bubble" that envelops and protects our solar system — appears to
determine the orientation ...
Rebuilding the brain after stroke
2014-02-14
DETROIT – Enhancing the brain's inherent ability to rebuild itself after a stroke with molecular
components of stem cells holds enormous promise for treating the leading cause of long-term
disability in adults.
Michael Chopp, Ph.D., Scientific Director of the Henry Ford Neuroscience Institute, will present
this approach to treating neurological diseases Thursday, Feb. 13, at the American Heart
Association's International Stroke Conference in San Diego.
Although most stroke victims recover some ability to voluntarily use their hands and other body
parts, half are ...
Amidst bitter cold and rising energy costs, new concerns about energy insecurity
2014-02-14
February 13,2014 --With many regions of the country braced by an unrelenting cold snap, the problem of energy insecurity continues to go unreported despite its toll on the most vulnerable. In a new brief, researchers at Columbia University's Mailman School of Public Health paint a picture of the families most impacted by this problem and suggest recommendations to alleviate its chokehold on millions of struggling Americans. The authors note that government programs to address energy insecurity are coming up short, despite rising energy costs.
Energy Insecurity (EI) is ...
Harvard scientists find cell fate switch that decides liver, or pancreas?
2014-02-14
Harvard stem cell scientists have a new theory for how stem cells decide whether to become
liver or pancreatic cells during development. A cell's fate, the researchers found, is determined by
the nearby presence of prostaglandin E2, a messenger molecule best known for its role in
inflammation and pain. The discovery, published in the journal Developmental Cell, could potentially
make liver and pancreas cells easier to generate both in the lab and for future cell therapies.
Wolfram Goessling, MD, PhD, and Trista North, PhD, both principal faculty members of the
Harvard ...
Arctic biodiversity under serious threat from climate change according to new report
2014-02-14
Unique and irreplaceable Arctic wildlife and landscapes are crucially at risk due to global warming caused by human activities according to the Arctic Biodiversity Assessment (ABA), a new report prepared by 253 scientists from 15 countries under the auspices of the Conservation of Arctic Flora and Fauna (CAFF), the biodiversity working group of the Arctic Council.
"An entire bio-climatic zone, the high Arctic, may disappear. Polar bears and the other highly adapted organisms cannot move further north, so they may go extinct. We risk losing several species forever," says ...
LAST 30 PRESS RELEASES:
A map for single-atom catalysts
What about tritiated water release from Fukushima? Ocean model simulations provide an objective scientific knowledge on the long-term tritium distribution
Growing crisis of communicable disease in Canada in tandem with US cuts
Women get better at managing their anger as they age
Illegal shark product trade evident in Australia and New Zealand
New search tool brings 21% better accuracy for robotics developers
New model extracts sentence-level proof to verify events, boosting fact-checking accuracy for journalists, legal teams, and policymakers
Efficient carbon integration of CO₂ in propane aromatization over acidic zeolites
FPGA-accelerated AI for demultiplexing multimode fiber towards next-generation communications
Vitamin D3 nanoemulsion significantly improves core symptoms in children with autism: A clinical trial
Microfluidic point-of-care device accurately measures bilirubin in blood serum: A pilot study
Amygdalin shows strong binding and stabilizing effects on HER2 receptor: A computational study for breast cancer therapy
Bond behavior of FRP bars in concrete under reversed cyclic loading: an experimental study
Milky Way-like galaxy M83 consumes high-speed clouds
Study: What we learned from record-breaking 2021 heat wave and what we can expect in the future
Transforming treatment outcomes for people with OCD
Damage from smoke and respiratory viruses mitigated in mice via a common signaling pathway
New software tool could help better understand childhood cancer
Healthy lifestyle linked to lower diverticulitis risk, irrespective of genetic susceptibility
Women 65+ still at heightened risk of cervical cancer caused by HPV
‘Inflammatory’ diet during pregnancy may raise child’s diabetes type 1 risk
Effective therapies needed to halt rise in eco-anxiety, says psychology professor
Nature-friendly farming boosts biodiversity and yields but may require new subsidies
Against the odds: Endometriosis linked to four times higher pregnancy rates than other causes of infertility, new study reveals
Microplastics discovered in human reproductive fluids, new study reveals
Family ties and firm performance: How cousin marriage traditions shape informal businesses in Africa
Novel flu vaccine adjuvant improves protection against influenza viruses, study finds
Manipulation of light at the nanoscale helps advance biosensing
New mechanism discovered in ovarian cancer peritoneal metastasis: YWHAB restriction drives stemness and chemoresistance
New study links blood metabolites and immune cells to increased risk of urolithiasis
[Press-News.org] Mixed genesAn interactive world map of human genetic history reveals likely genetic impacts of historical events