Reconstructing prehistoric African population structure
Authors list
Pontus Skoglund Jessica C Thompson Mary E Prendergast Alissa Mittnik Kendra Sirak Mateja Hajdinjak Tasneem Salie Nadin Rohland Swapan Mallick Alexander Peltzer Anja Heinze Iñigo Olalde Matthew Ferry Eadaoin Harney Megan Michel Kristin Stewardson Jessica I Cerezo-Román Chrissy Chiumia Alison Crowther Elizabeth Gomani-Chindebvu Agness O Gidna Katherine M Grillo I Taneli Helenius Garrett Hellenthal Richard Helm Mark Horton Saioa López Audax ZP Mabulla John Parkington Ceri Shipton Mark G Thomas Ruth Tibesasa Menno Welling Vanessa M Hayes Douglas J Kennett Raj Ramesar Matthias Meyer Svante Pääbo Nick Patterson Alan G Morris Nicole Boivin Ron Pinhasi Johannes Krause David Reich Toggle all authors (44)
Abstract
We assembled genome-wide data from 16 prehistoric Africans. We show that the anciently divergent lineage that comprises the primary ancestry of the southern African San had a wider distribution in the past, contributing approximately two-thirds of the ancestry of Malawi hunter-gatherers ∼8,100-2,500 years ago and approximately one-third of the ancestry of Tanzanian hunter-gatherers ∼1,400 years ago. We document how the spread of farmers from western Africa involved complete replacement of local hunter-gatherers in some regions, and we track the spread of herders by showing that the population of a ∼3,100-year-old pastoralist from Tanzania contributed ancestry to people from northeastern to southern Africa, including a ∼1,200-year-old southern African pastoralist. The deepest diversifications of African lineages were complex, involving either repeated gene flow among geographically disparate groups or a lineage more deeply diverging than that of the San contributing more to some western African populations than to others. We finally leverage ancient genomes to document episodes of natural selection in southern African populations. PAPERCLIP.
Journal details
Journal Cell
Volume 171
Issue number 1
Pages 59-71.e21
Available online
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Full text links
Publisher website (DOI) 10.1016/j.cell.2017.08.049
Europe PubMed Central 28938123
Pubmed 28938123
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