They Share Telltale Mutations With Modern-Day Indian Population, Reveals Genetic Research
July 23, 2009
Washington: Genetic research conducted by a team of Indian scientists has indicated that aborigines, who initially arrived in Australia via south Asia, may have originated from India.
The evidence was found by Dr Raghavendra Rao, who worked with a team of researchers from the Anthropological Survey of India, to find telltale mutations in modern-day Indian populations that are exclusively shared by Aborigines.
For the research, the team sequenced 966 complete mitochondrial DNA genomes from Indian 'relic populations'.
"Mitochondrial DNA is inherited only from the mother and so allows us to accurately trace ancestry. We found certain mutations in the DNA sequences of the Indian tribes we sampled that are specific to Australian Aborigines," said Rao.
This shared ancestry suggests that the Aborigine population migrated to Australia via the so-called "Southern Route".
The "Southern Route" dispersal of modern humans suggests movement of a group of hunter-gatherers from the Horn of Africa, across the mouth of the Red Sea into Arabia and southern Asia at least 50 thousand years ago. Subsequently, the modern human populations expanded rapidly along the coastlines of southern Asia, southeastern Asia and Indonesia to arrive in Australia at least 45 thousand years ago.
The genetic evidence of this dispersal from the work of Rao and his colleagues is supported by archeological evidence of human occupation in the Lake Mungo area of Australia dated to approximately the same time period. Discussing the implications of the research, Rao said, "Human evolution is usually understood in terms of millions of years. This direct DNA evidence indicates that the emergence of 'anatomically modern' humans in Africa and the spread of these humans to other parts of the world happened only fifty thousand or so years ago."
"In this respect, populations in the Indian subcontinent harbor DNA footprints of the earliest expansion out of Africa," he added. "Understanding human evolution helps us to understand the biological and cultural expressions of these people, with far reaching implications for human welfare," he added. ANI
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CONTINENTAL COUSINS: Aboriginal population migrated to Australia via the so-called 'Southern Route', say Indian researchers
Australian Aborigines Initially Arrived Via South Asia
ScienceDaily (July 21, 2009) — Genetic research indicates that Australian Aborigines initially arrived via south Asia. Researchers have found telltale mutations in modern-day Indian populations that are exclusively shared by Aborigines.
Dr Raghavendra Rao worked with a team of researchers from the Anthropological Survey of India to sequence 966 complete mitochondrial DNA genomes from Indian 'relic populations'. He said, "Mitochondrial DNA is inherited only from the mother and so allows us to accurately trace ancestry. We found certain mutations in the DNA sequences of the Indian tribes we sampled that are specific to Australian Aborigines. This shared ancestry suggests that the Aborigine population migrated to Australia via the so-called 'Southern Route'".
The 'Southern Route' dispersal of modern humans suggests movement of a group of hunter-gatherers from the Horn of Africa, across the mouth of the Red Sea into Arabia and southern Asia at least 50 thousand years ago. Subsequently, the modern human populations expanded rapidly along the coastlines of southern Asia, southeastern Asia and Indonesia to arrive in Australia at least 45 thousand years ago. The genetic evidence of this dispersal from the work of Rao and his colleagues is supported by archeological evidence of human occupation in the Lake Mungo area of Australia dated to approximately the same time period.
Discussing the implications of the research, Rao said, "Human evolution is usually understood in terms of millions of years. This direct DNA evidence indicates that the emergence of 'anatomically modern' humans in Africa and the spread of these humans to other parts of the world happened only fifty thousand or so years ago. In this respect, populations in the Indian subcontinent harbor DNA footprints of the earliest expansion out of Africa. Understanding human evolution helps us to understand the biological and cultural expressions of these people, with far reaching implications for human welfare."
Journal reference:
1. Satish Kumar, Rajasekhara REDDY Ravuri, Padmaja Koneru, B P Urade, B N Sarkar, A Chandrasekar and V R Rao. Reconstructing Indian-Australian phylogenetic link. BMC Evolutionary Biology, (in press) [link] http://www.biomedcentral.com/bmcevolbiol/
Reconstructing Indian-Australian phylogenetic link.
Satish Kumar , Rajasekhara REDDY Ravuri
, Padmaja Koneru
, B P Urade
, B N Sarkar
,A Chandrasekar
and V R Rao
BMC Evolutionary Biology 2009, 9:173doi:10.1186/1471-2148-9-173
Published: 22 July 2009
Background
An early dispersal of biologically and behaviorally modern humans from their African origins to Australia, by at least 45 thousand years via southern Asia has been suggested by studies based on morphology, archaeology and genetics. However, mtDNA lineages sampled so far from south Asia, eastern Asia and Australasia show non-overlapping distributions of haplogroups within pan Eurasian M and N macrohaplogroups. Likewise, support from the archaeology is still ambiguous.
Results
In our completely sequenced 966-mitochondrial genomes from 26 relic tribes of India, we have identified seven genomes, which share two synonymous polymorphisms with the M42 haplogroup, which is specific to Australian Aborigines.
Conclusions
Our results showing a shared mtDNA lineage between Indians and Australian Aborigines provides direct genetic evidence of an early colonization of Australia through south Asia, following the "southern route".
Adapted from materials provided by BioMed Central, viaEurekAlert!, a service of AAAS.
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/07/090721214628.htm
