Genome-wide Ancestry and Demographic History of African-Descendant Maroon Communities from French Guiana and Suriname.

ABSTRACT: The transatlantic slave trade was the largest forced migration in world history. However, the origins of the enslaved Africans and their admixture dynamics remain unclear. To investigate the demographic history of African-descendant Marron populations, we generated genome-wide data (4.3 million markers) from 107 individuals from three African-descendant populations in South America, as well as 124 individuals from six west African populations. Throughout the Americas, thousands of enslaved Africans managed to escape captivity and establish lasting communities, such as the Noir Marron. We find that this population has the highest proportion of African ancestry (∼98%) of any African-descendant population analyzed to date, presumably because of centuries of genetic isolation. By contrast, Afr

SUBMITTER: Fortes-Lima C 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC5673667 | biostudies-literature | 2017 Nov

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature