Genetic divergence disclosing a rapid prehistorical dispersion of Native Americans in Central and South America

PLoS One. 2012;7(9):e44788. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0044788. Epub 2012 Sep 6.

Abstract

An accurate estimate of the divergence time between Native Americans is important for understanding the initial entry and early dispersion of human beings in the New World. Current methods for estimating the genetic divergence time of populations could seriously depart from a linear relationship with the true divergence for multiple populations of a different population size and significant population expansion. Here, to address this problem, we propose a novel measure to estimate the genetic divergence time of populations. Computer simulation revealed that the new measure maintained an excellent linear correlation with the population divergence time in complicated multi-population scenarios with population expansion. Utilizing the new measure and microsatellite data of 21 Native American populations, we investigated the genetic divergences of the Native American populations. The results indicated that genetic divergences between North American populations are greater than that between Central and South American populations. None of the divergences, however, were large enough to constitute convincing evidence supporting the two-wave or multi-wave migration model for the initial entry of human beings into America. The genetic affinity of the Native American populations was further explored using Neighbor-Net and the genetic divergences suggested that these populations could be categorized into four genetic groups living in four different ecologic zones. The divergence of the population groups suggests that the early dispersion of human beings in America was a multi-step procedure. Further, the divergences suggest the rapid dispersion of Native Americans in Central and South Americas after a long standstill period in North America.

Publication types

  • Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

  • Genetic Variation*
  • Humans
  • Indians, Central American / genetics*
  • Indians, South American / genetics*
  • Microsatellite Repeats

Grants and funding

This work was supported by grants from Shanghai Institutes of Biological Sciences (2010KIP206 to YH) and National Natural Science Foundation of China (30890034 and 30625016 to LJ, 81100997 and 31171279 to YH). LJ was also supported by Shanghai Leading Academic Discipline Project (B111) and the Center for Evolutionary Biology at Fudan University. The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.