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The distribution of the ancestral haplotype in finite stepping‐stone models with population expansion
Author(s) -
Satta Y.,
Takahata N.
Publication year - 2004
Publication title -
molecular ecology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 2.619
H-Index - 225
eISSN - 1365-294X
pISSN - 0962-1083
DOI - 10.1046/j.1365-294x.2003.02069.x
Subject(s) - biology , haplotype , population , coalescent theory , most recent common ancestor , demographic history , evolutionary biology , genetics , phylogenetics , genetic variation , gene , demography , allele , sociology
Recent extensive analyses of human DNA polymorphism reveal that the ancestral haplotype at various genetic loci occurs almost exclusively in African samples. We develop a coalescence‐based simulation method in stepping‐stone models with population expansion and examine the probability ( P A ) that the ancestral haplotype is found in African samples and the probability ( Q A ) that the most recent common ancestor of sampled genes occurs in Africa. These probabilities and other summary statistics are used to infer the human demographic history. It is shown that the high observed P A value cannot be explained simply by sampling bias. Rather, it suggests that the African population has been more strongly subdivided and isolated from each other than the non‐African population and that there must have been some African populations which were not directly involved in the Out‐of‐Africa expansion in the late Pleistocene.