Skip Navigation


MBE Advance Access originally published online on December 18, 2007
Molecular Biology and Evolution 2008 25(2):468-474; doi:10.1093/molbev/msm277
This Article
Right arrow Full Text Freely available
Right arrow FREE Full Text (PDF) Freely available
Right arrow Supplementary Material
Right arrow All Versions of this Article:
25/2/468    most recent
msm277v2
msm277v1
Right arrow Alert me when this article is cited
Right arrow Alert me if a correction is posted
Services
Right arrow Email this article to a friend
Right arrow Similar articles in this journal
Right arrow Similar articles in PubMed
Right arrow Alert me to new issues of the journal
Right arrow Add to My Personal Archive
Right arrow Download to citation manager
Right arrowRequest Permissions
Google Scholar
Right arrow Articles by Atkinson, Q. D.
Right arrow Articles by Drummond, A. J.
Right arrow Search for Related Content
PubMed
Right arrow PubMed Citation
Right arrow Articles by Atkinson, Q. D.
Right arrow Articles by Drummond, A. J.
Social Bookmarking
Add to CiteULike   Add to Connotea   Add to Del.icio.us  
What's this?

© The Author 2007. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the Society for Molecular Biology and Evolution. All rights reserved. For permissions, please e-mail: journals.permissions@oxfordjournals.org

Research Articles

mtDNA Variation Predicts Population Size in Humans and Reveals a Major Southern Asian Chapter in Human Prehistory

Quentin D. Atkinson*, Russell D. Gray{dagger} and Alexei J. Drummond{ddagger}

* Institute of Cognitive and Evolutionary Anthropology, University of Oxford, 58A Banbury Rd, Oxford, OX2 6QS, United Kingdom
{dagger} Psychology Department, University of Auckland, Auckland, New Zealand
{ddagger} Bioinformatics Institute and Department of Computer Science, University of Auckland, Auckland, New Zealand

E-mail: quentin.atkinson{at}anthro.ox.ac.uk.

Accepted for publication December 11, 2007.

The relative timing and size of regional human population growth following our expansion from Africa remain unknown. Human mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) diversity carries a legacy of our population history. Given a set of sequences, we can use coalescent theory to estimate past population size through time and draw inferences about human population history. However, recent work has challenged the validity of using mtDNA diversity to infer species population sizes. Here we use Bayesian coalescent inference methods, together with a global data set of 357 human mtDNA coding-region sequences, to infer human population sizes through time across 8 major geographic regions. Our estimates of relative population sizes show remarkable concordance with the contemporary regional distribution of humans across Africa, Eurasia, and the Americas, indicating that mtDNA diversity is a good predictor of population size in humans. Plots of population size through time show slow growth in sub-Saharan Africa beginning 143–193 kya, followed by a rapid expansion into Eurasia after the emergence of the first non-African mtDNA lineages 50–70 kya. Outside Africa, the earliest and fastest growth is inferred in Southern Asia ~52 kya, followed by a succession of growth phases in Northern and Central Asia (~49 kya), Australia (~48 kya), Europe (~42 kya), the Middle East and North Africa (~40 kya), New Guinea (~39 kya), the Americas (~18 kya), and a second expansion in Europe (~10–15 kya). Comparisons of relative regional population sizes through time suggest that between approximately 45 and 20 kya most of humanity lived in Southern Asia. These findings not only support the use of mtDNA data for estimating human population size but also provide a unique picture of human prehistory and demonstrate the importance of Southern Asia to our recent evolutionary past.

Key Words: mitochondrial DNA • human evolution • population genetics • Bayesian skyline plot, anthropology

Beth Shapiro, Associate Editor


Add to CiteULike CiteULike   Add to Connotea Connotea   Add to Del.icio.us Del.icio.us    What's this?


This article has been cited by other articles:


Home page
 Phil Trans R Soc BHome page
R. Foley and C. Gamble
The ecology of social transitions in human evolution
Phil Trans R Soc B, November 12, 2009; 364(1533): 3267 - 3279.
[Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]

Home page
 Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USAHome page
M. Petraglia, C. Clarkson, N. Boivin, M. Haslam, R. Korisettar, G. Chaubey, P. Ditchfield, D. Fuller, H. James, S. Jones, et al.
Population increase and environmental deterioration correspond with microlithic innovations in South Asia ca. 35,000 years ago
PNAS, July 28, 2009; 106(30): 12261 - 12266.
[Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]

Home page
 ScienceHome page
A. W. Briggs, J. M. Good, R. E. Green, J. Krause, T. Maricic, U. Stenzel, C. Lalueza-Fox, P. Rudan, D. Brajkovic, Z. Kucan, et al.
Targeted Retrieval and Analysis of Five Neandertal mtDNA Genomes
Science, July 17, 2009; 325(5938): 318 - 321.
[Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]

Home page
 ScienceHome page
A. Powell, S. Shennan, and M. G. Thomas
Late Pleistocene Demography and the Appearance of Modern Human Behavior
Science, June 5, 2009; 324(5932): 1298 - 1301.
[Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]

Home page
 Mol Biol EvolHome page
K. B. Schroeder, M. Jakobsson, M. H. Crawford, T. G. Schurr, S. M. Boca, D. F. Conrad, R. Y. Tito, L. P. Osipova, L. A. Tarskaia, S. I. Zhadanov, et al.
Haplotypic Background of a Private Allele at High Frequency in the Americas
Mol. Biol. Evol., May 1, 2009; 26(5): 995 - 1016.
[Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]

Home page
 Proc R Soc BHome page
Q. D Atkinson, R. D Gray, and A. J Drummond
Bayesian coalescent inference of major human mitochondrial DNA haplogroup expansions in Africa
Proc R Soc B, January 22, 2009; 276(1655): 367 - 373.
[Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]

Home page
 Mol Biol EvolHome page
B. M. Henn, C. R. Gignoux, M. W. Feldman, and J. L. Mountain
Characterizing the Time Dependency of Human Mitochondrial DNA Mutation Rate Estimates
Mol. Biol. Evol., January 1, 2009; 26(1): 217 - 230.
[Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]


Disclaimer: Please note that abstracts for content published before 1996 were created through digital scanning and may therefore not exactly replicate the text of the original print issues. All efforts have been made to ensure accuracy, but the Publisher will not be held responsible for any remaining inaccuracies. If you require any further clarification, please contact our Customer Services Department.