Two ancient human genomes reveal Polynesian ancestry among the indigenous Botocudos of Brazil.
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Authors
Malaspinas, Anna-Sapfo
Lao, Oscar
Schroeder, Hannes
Rasmussen, Morten
Raghavan, Maanasa https://orcid.org/0000-0003-1997-0739
Abstract
Understanding the peopling of the Americas remains an important and challenging question. Here, we present (14)C dates, and morphological, isotopic and genomic sequence data from two human skulls from the state of Minas Gerais, Brazil, part of one of the indigenous groups known as 'Botocudos'. We find that their genomic ancestry is Polynesian, with no detectable Native American component. Radiocarbon analysis of the skulls shows that the individuals had died prior to the beginning of the 19th century. Our findings could either represent genomic evidence of Polynesians reaching South America during their Pacific expansion, or European-mediated transport.
Description
Keywords
Brazil, DNA, Mitochondrial, Genome, Human, Humans, Indians, South American, Native Hawaiian or Other Pacific Islander, Radiometric Dating
Journal Title
Curr Biol
Conference Name
Journal ISSN
0960-9822
1879-0445
1879-0445
Volume Title
24
Publisher
Elsevier BV
Publisher DOI
Sponsorship
GeoGenetics members were supported by the Lundbeck Foundation, the Danish National Research Foundation (DNRF94) and the European Union (FP7/2007-2013/317184 and 319209). A.S.M. was supported by a fellowship from the Swiss National Science Foundation (PBSKP3_143529); M.D. by the US National Science Foundation (grant DBI-1103639); P.L.J. by the National Institutes of Health (grant K99 GM104158); V.F.G. by a Strategic Training for Advanced Genetic Epidemiology (STAGE) fellowship, University of Toronto.