Ancient DNA from nomads in 2500-year-old archeological sites of Pengyang, China.
Six human remains (dating approximately 2500 years ago) were excavated from Pengyang, China, an area occupied by both ancient nomadic and farming people. The funerary objects found with these remains suggested they were nomads. To further confirm their ancestry, we analyzed both the maternal lineages and paternal lineages of the ancient DNA. From the mitochondrial DNA, six haplotypes were identified as three haplogroups: C, D4 and M10. The haplotype-sharing populations and phylogenetic analyses revealed that these individuals were closely associated with the ancient Xiongnu and modern northern Asians. Single-nucleotide polymorphism analysis of Y chromosomes from four male samples that were typed as haplogroup Q indicated that these people had originated in Siberia. These results show that these ancient people from Pengyang present a close genetic affinity to nomadic people, indicating that northern nomads had reached the Central Plain area of China nearly 2500 years ago.
Zhao
Yong-Bin
YB
Laboratory of Ancient DNA, Research Center for Chinese Frontier Archaeology of Jilin University, Changchun, China.
Li
Hong-Jie
HJ
Cai
Da-Wei
DW
Li
Chun-Xiang
CX
Zhang
Quan-Chao
QC
Zhu
Hong
H
Zhou
Hui
H
D001106:Archaeology; D002681:China; D004272:DNA, Mitochondrial / Q000145:classification / Q000235:genetics*; D005202:Asia, Eastern / Q000208:ethnology; D005260:Female; D005580:Fossils; D006239:Haplotypes; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D010802:Phylogeny; D020641:Polymorphism, Single Nucleotide; D012800:Siberia / Q000208:ethnology; D014171:Transients and Migrants
D004272:DNA, Mitochondrial