Population structure in a comprehensive genomic data set on human microsatellite variation

Trevor J. Pemberton, Michael DeGiorgio, Noah A. Rosenberg

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

92 Scopus citations

Abstract

Over the past two decades, microsatellite genotypes have provided the data for landmark studies of human population-genetic variation. However, the various microsatellite data sets have been prepared with different procedures and sets of markers, so that it has been difficult to synthesize available data for a comprehensive analysis. Here, we combine eight human population-genetic data sets at the 645 microsatellite loci they share in common, accounting for procedural differences in the production of the different data sets, to assemble a single data set containing 5795 individuals from 267 worldwide populations. We perform a systematic analysis of genetic relatedness, detecting 240 intra-population and 92 interpopulation pairs of previously unidentified close relatives and proposing standardized subsets of unrelated individuals for use in future studies. We then augment the human data with a data set of 84 chimpanzees at the 246 loci they share in common with the human samples. Multidimensional scaling and neighbor-joining analyses of these data sets offer new insights into the structure of human populations and enable a comparison of genetic variation patterns in chimpanzees with those in humans. Our combined data sets are the largest of their kind reported to date and provide a resource for use in human population-genetic studies.

Original languageEnglish (US)
Pages (from-to)891-907
Number of pages17
JournalG3: Genes, Genomes, Genetics
Volume3
Issue number5
DOIs
StatePublished - May 2013

All Science Journal Classification (ASJC) codes

  • Molecular Biology
  • Genetics
  • Genetics(clinical)

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