TY - JOUR
T1 - Resolving the ancestry of Austronesian-speaking populations
AU - Soares, Pedro
AU - Trejaut, Jean Alain
AU - Rito, Teresa
AU - Cavadas, Bruno
AU - Hill, Catherine
AU - Eng, KenKhong
AU - Mormina, Maru
AU - Brandão, Andreia
AU - Fraser, Ross M.
AU - Wang, Tse-Yi
AU - Loo, Jun-Hun
AU - Snell, Christopher R.
AU - Ko, Tsang-Ming
AU - Amorim, A.
AU - Pala, Maria
AU - Macaulay, Vincent
AU - Bulbeck, Francis
AU - Wilson, James F
AU - Gusmão, Leonor
AU - Pereira, Luisa
AU - Oppenheimer, Stephen James
AU - Lin, Marie
AU - Richards, Martin
PY - 2016
Y1 - 2016
N2 - There are two very different interpretations of the prehistory of Island Southeast Asia (ISEA), with genetic evidence invoked in support of both. The "out-of-Taiwan" model proposes a major Late Holocene expansion of Neolithic Austronesian speakers from Taiwan. An alternative, proposing that Late Glacial/postglacial sea-level rises triggered largely autochthonous dispersals, accounts for some otherwise enigmatic genetic patterns, but fails to explain the Austronesian language dispersal. Combining mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA), Y-chromosome and genome-wide data, we performed the most comprehensive analysis of the region to date, obtaining highly consistent results across all three systems and allowing us to reconcile the models. We infer a primarily common ancestry for Taiwan/ISEA populations established before the Neolithic, but also detected clear signals of two minor Late Holocene migrations, probably representing Neolithic input from both Mainland Southeast Asia and South China, via Taiwan. This latter may therefore have mediated the Austronesian language dispersal, implying small-scale migration and language shift rather than large-scale expansion.
AB - There are two very different interpretations of the prehistory of Island Southeast Asia (ISEA), with genetic evidence invoked in support of both. The "out-of-Taiwan" model proposes a major Late Holocene expansion of Neolithic Austronesian speakers from Taiwan. An alternative, proposing that Late Glacial/postglacial sea-level rises triggered largely autochthonous dispersals, accounts for some otherwise enigmatic genetic patterns, but fails to explain the Austronesian language dispersal. Combining mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA), Y-chromosome and genome-wide data, we performed the most comprehensive analysis of the region to date, obtaining highly consistent results across all three systems and allowing us to reconcile the models. We infer a primarily common ancestry for Taiwan/ISEA populations established before the Neolithic, but also detected clear signals of two minor Late Holocene migrations, probably representing Neolithic input from both Mainland Southeast Asia and South China, via Taiwan. This latter may therefore have mediated the Austronesian language dispersal, implying small-scale migration and language shift rather than large-scale expansion.
U2 - 10.1007/s00439-015-1620-z
DO - 10.1007/s00439-015-1620-z
M3 - Article
SN - 0340-6717
VL - 135
SP - 309
EP - 326
JO - Human Genetics
JF - Human Genetics
IS - 3
ER -