Genetic characterization of four Austronesian-speaking populations

Abstract

Ascertaining the genetic relationships between Austronesian populations is paramount to understanding their dispersal throughout the islands of the Pacific and Indian Oceans. The start of the Austronesian expansion has been dated to approximately 6,000 years ago, and from linguistic and archeological evidence, the origin of this dispersal may have been the island of Formosa. Consequently, the Taiwanese aboriginal populations and their phylogenetic relationship to the Austronesian-speaking groups from Madagascar at the occidental fringes of the expansion are of great interest. In this study, allelic frequencies from six polymorphic point mutation loci were assessed in the Austronesianspeaking populations of Madagascar, the Atayal aborigines of Formosa, and the general populations of Bali and Java. These allelic frequencies were compared and analyzed with the corresponding values from eight other worldwide populations from geographically targeted regions. The group from Madagascar is genetically distinct from their east-African neighbor from Zimbabwe. Our data also indicates that the Ami and the Atayal aborigines in the island of Taiwan, which occupy adjacent territories, differ sharply genetically. Genetic differences were also found between the populations of Bali and Java, belying their geographical proximity. Our results indicate that the east-African population from Madagascar phylogenetically segregates intermediate between mainland east-African and east-Asian groups, corroborating linguistic data indicating the Austronesian influence on this population.

Autosomal STR Variation in Five Austronesian Populations

“…However, the investigators also reported evidence of a prolonged isolation from mainland Chinese and other Asian influences in the recent past. Studies based on autosomal (Sewerin et al 2002;Chow et al 2005) and mtDNA (Horai et al 1995) markers have also demonstrated genetic uniqueness among the indigenous groups, implying varying temporal and/or spatial sources for the initial colonization of Formosa. One paternal lineage study found that the Ami stand out from the other aboriginal groups because of their closer genetic association with both South China and the Philippines.…”

Farming and Language in Island Southeast Asia

“…Furthermore, Austronesian language-speaking populations tend to mimic, genetically, any non-Austronesian populations with which they are in contact, rather than presenting starkly contrasting genetic histories. This is true of all areas in which there are both Austronesian-speaking and non-Austronesianspeaking populations, including Madagascar, Southeast Asia, and Melanesia (Chow et al 2005;Hurles et al 2005;Li et al 2008). This implies that the genetic history of Austronesian speakers, in whichever region they are found, implicates the preexisting populations of these regions as much as any putative migration out of Taiwan.…”

Seventeen Y-chromosomal short tandem repeat haplotypes in seven groups of population living in Taiwan

“…There were different clustering results for the tribes in Taiwan proper. However, Ami tribe located in the eastern portion of Taiwan separated from other tribes by Central Mountain Range is found to be relatively different from other tribes in Taiwan proper [17,18]. The Taiwanese Han population includes the descendants of individuals who migrated from China in a number of waves of immigration beginning 400 years ago and up to 1949.…”