Genetic evidence for recent population mixture in India.
Most Indian groups descend from a mixture of two genetically divergent populations: Ancestral North Indians (ANI) related to Central Asians, Middle Easterners, Caucasians, and Europeans; and Ancestral South Indians (ASI) not closely related to groups outside the subcontinent. The date of mixture is unknown but has implications for understanding Indian history. We report genome-wide data from 73 groups from the Indian subcontinent and analyze linkage disequilibrium to estimate ANI-ASI mixture dates ranging from about 1,900 to 4,200 years ago. In a subset of groups, 100% of the mixture is consistent with having occurred during this period. These results show that India experienced a demographic transformation several thousand years ago, from a region in which major population mixture was common to one in which mixture even between closely related groups became rare because of a shift to endogamy.
Department of Genetics, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA 02115, USA. moorjani@genetics.med.harvard.edu
Priya
P
Moorjani
Kumarasamy
K
Thangaraj
Nick
N
Patterson
Mark
M
Lipson
Po-Ru
PR
Loh
Periyasamy
P
Govindaraj
Bonnie
B
Berger
David
D
Reich
Lalji
L
Singh
D005788:Gene Pool; D005828:Genetics, Population; D005843:Geography; D006801:Humans; D007194:India; D008037:Linguistics; D015810:Linkage Disequilibrium / Q000235:genetics; D008957:Models, Genetic; D025341:Principal Component Analysis; D013997:Time Factors; D044465:White People / Q000235:genetics