Inferring the demographic history of African farmers and pygmy hunter-gatherers using a multilocus resequencing data set.

ABSTRACT: The transition from hunting and gathering to farming involved a major cultural innovation that has spread rapidly over most of the globe in the last ten millennia. In sub-Saharan Africa, hunter-gatherers have begun to shift toward an agriculture-based lifestyle over the last 5,000 years. Only a few populations still base their mode of subsistence on hunting and gathering. The Pygmies are considered to be the largest group of mobile hunter-gatherers of Africa. They dwell in equatorial rainforests and are characterized by their short mean stature. However, little is known about the chronology of the demographic events-size changes, population splits, and gene flow--ultimately giving rise to contemporary Pygmy (Western and Eastern) groups and neighboring agricultural populations. We studied t

SUBMITTER: Patin E 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC2661362 | biostudies-literature | 2009 Apr

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature