Revealing the prehistoric settlement of Australia by Y chromosome and mtDNA analysis.

ABSTRACT: Published and new samples of Aboriginal Australians and Melanesians were analyzed for mtDNA (n=172) and Y variation (n=522), and the resulting profiles were compared with the branches known so far within the global mtDNA and the Y chromosome tree. (i) All Australian lineages are confirmed to fall within the mitochondrial founder branches M and N and the Y chromosomal founders C and F, which are associated with the exodus of modern humans from Africa approximately 50-70,000 years ago. The analysis reveals no evidence for any archaic maternal or paternal lineages in Australians, despite some suggestively robust features in the Australian fossil record, thus weakening the argument for continuity with any earlier Homo erectus populations in Southeast Asia. (ii) The tree of complete mtDNA seque

SUBMITTER: Hudjashov G 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC1885570 | biostudies-literature | 2007 May

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature