Evolutionary history and adaptation from high-coverage whole-genome sequences of diverse African hunter-gatherers.

ABSTRACT: To reconstruct modern human evolutionary history and identify loci that have shaped hunter-gatherer adaptation, we sequenced the whole genomes of five individuals in each of three different hunter-gatherer populations at > 60× coverage: Pygmies from Cameroon and Khoesan-speaking Hadza and Sandawe from Tanzania. We identify 13.4 million variants, substantially increasing the set of known human variation. We found evidence of archaic introgression in all three populations, and the distribution of time to most recent common ancestors from these regions is similar to that observed for introgressed regions in Europeans. Additionally, we identify numerous loci that harbor signatures of local adaptation, including genes involved in immunity, metabolism, olfactory and taste perception, reproductio

SUBMITTER: Lachance J 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC3426505 | biostudies-literature | 2012 Aug

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature