Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
. 2017 Apr 5;12(4):e0175080.
doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0175080. eCollection 2017.

Phylogeography of Y-chromosome haplogroup O3a2b2-N6 reveals patrilineal traces of Austronesian populations on the eastern coastal regions of Asia

Lan-Hai Wei  1   2 , Shi Yan  1 , Yik-Ying Teo  3 , Yun-Zhi Huang  1 , Ling-Xiang Wang  1 , Ge Yu  1 , Woei-Yuh Saw  3 , Rick Twee-Hee Ong  3 , Yan Lu  4 , Chao Zhang  4   5 , Shu-Hua Xu  4   5   6   7 , Li Jin  1   7 , Hui Li  1
Affiliations

Phylogeography of Y-chromosome haplogroup O3a2b2-N6 reveals patrilineal traces of Austronesian populations on the eastern coastal regions of Asia

Lan-Hai Wei et al. PLoS One. .

Abstract

Austronesian diffusion is considered one of the greatest dispersals in human history; it led to the peopling of an extremely vast region, ranging from Madagascar in the Indian Ocean to Easter Island in Remote Oceania. The Y-chromosome haplogroup O3a2b*-P164(xM134), a predominant paternal lineage of Austronesian populations, is found at high frequencies in Polynesian populations. However, the internal phylogeny of this haplogroup remains poorly investigated. In this study, we analyzed -seventeen Y-chromosome sequences of haplogroup O3a2b*-P164(xM134) and generated a revised phylogenetic tree of this lineage based on 310 non-private Y-chromosome polymorphisms. We discovered that all available O3a2b*-P164(xM134) samples belong to the newly defined haplogroup O3a2b2-N6 and samples from Austronesian populations belong to the sublineage O3a2b2a2-F706. Additionally, we genotyped a series of Y-chromosome polymorphisms in a large collection of samples from China. We confirmed that the sublineage O3a2b2a2b-B451 is unique to Austronesian populations. We found that O3a2b2-N6 samples are widely distributed on the eastern coastal regions of Asia, from Korea to Vietnam. Furthermore, we propose- that the O3a2b2a2b-B451 lineage represents a genetic connection between ancestors of Austronesian populations and ancient populations in North China, where foxtail millet was domesticated about 11,000 years ago. The large number of newly defined Y-chromosome polymorphisms and the revised phylogenetic tree of O3a2b2-N6 will be helpful to explore the origin of proto-Austronesians and the early diffusion process of Austronesian populations.

PubMed Disclaimer

Conflict of interest statement

Competing Interests: The authors have declared that no competing interests exist.

Figures

Fig 1
Fig 1. The revised phylogenetic tree of the Y-chromosome haplogroup O3a2b2-N6.
Fig 2
Fig 2. The phylogeographic distributions of sublineages of haplogroup O3a2b2-N6.
Fig 3
Fig 3. Y-STR network of haplogroup O3a2b*-P164(xM134).
See this image and copyright information in PMC

Similar articles

See all similar articles

Cited by

  • The Marquesans at the fringes of the Austronesian expansion.
    Palencia-Madrid L, Baeta M, Villaescusa P, Nuñez C, de Pancorbo MM, Luis JR, Fadhlaoui-Zid K, Somarelli J, Garcia-Bertrand R, Herrera RJ. Palencia-Madrid L, et al. Eur J Hum Genet. 2019 May;27(5):801-810. doi: 10.1038/s41431-019-0336-2. Epub 2019 Jan 25. Eur J Hum Genet. 2019. PMID: 30683925 Free PMC article.
  • The formation of proto-austronesians: insights from a revised phylogeography of the paternal founder lineage.
    Yu HX, Zhang XP, Bai Y, Liu KJ, Li H, Li YL, Sun J, Wei LH. Yu HX, et al. Mol Genet Genomics. 2023 Nov;298(6):1301-1308. doi: 10.1007/s00438-023-02054-w. Epub 2023 Jul 27. Mol Genet Genomics. 2023. PMID: 37498359
  • A northern Chinese origin of Austronesian agriculture: new evidence on traditional Formosan cereals.
    Sagart L, Hsu TF, Tsai YC, Wu CC, Huang LT, Chen YC, Chen YF, Tseng YC, Lin HY, Hsing YC. Sagart L, et al. Rice (N Y). 2018 Oct 11;11(1):57. doi: 10.1186/s12284-018-0247-9. Rice (N Y). 2018. PMID: 30306280 Free PMC article.
  • Delineating the dispersal of Y-chromosome sub-haplogroup O2a2b-P164 among Austronesian-speaking populations.
    Luis JR, Palencia-Madrid L, Runfeldt G, Garcia-Bertrand R, Herrera RJ. Luis JR, et al. Sci Rep. 2024 Jan 24;14(1):2066. doi: 10.1038/s41598-024-52293-z. Sci Rep. 2024. PMID: 38267477 Free PMC article.
  • Genomic insights into the formation of human populations in East Asia.
    Wang CC, Yeh HY, Popov AN, Zhang HQ, Matsumura H, Sirak K, Cheronet O, Kovalev A, Rohland N, Kim AM, Mallick S, Bernardos R, Tumen D, Zhao J, Liu YC, Liu JY, Mah M, Wang K, Zhang Z, Adamski N, Broomandkhoshbacht N, Callan K, Candilio F, Carlson KSD, Culleton BJ, Eccles L, Freilich S, Keating D, Lawson AM, Mandl K, Michel M, Oppenheimer J, Özdoğan KT, Stewardson K, Wen S, Yan S, Zalzala F, Chuang R, Huang CJ, Looh H, Shiung CC, Nikitin YG, Tabarev AV, Tishkin AA, Lin S, Sun ZY, Wu XM, Yang TL, Hu X, Chen L, Du H, Bayarsaikhan J, Mijiddorj E, Erdenebaatar D, Iderkhangai TO, Myagmar E, Kanzawa-Kiriyama H, Nishino M, Shinoda KI, Shubina OA, Guo J, Cai W, Deng Q, Kang L, Li D, Li D, Lin R, Nini, Shrestha R, Wang LX, Wei L, Xie G, Yao H, Zhang M, He G, Yang X, Hu R, Robbeets M, Schiffels S, Kennett DJ, Jin L, Li H, Krause J, Pinhasi R, Reich D. Wang CC, et al. Nature. 2021 Mar;591(7850):413-419. doi: 10.1038/s41586-021-03336-2. Epub 2021 Feb 22. Nature. 2021. PMID: 33618348 Free PMC article.
See all "Cited by" articles

References

    1. Blust R. Austronesian culture history: some linguistic inferences and their relations to the archaeological record. World Archaeology. 1976;8:19–43.
    1. Ross M. The Batanic languages in relation to the early history of the Malayo-Polynesian subgroup of Austronesian. Journal of Austronesian Studies. 2005;1(2):1–24.
    1. Bellwood P. Formosan Prehistory and Austronesian Dispersal In: Blundell D, editor. Austronesian Taiwan: Linguistics, history, ethnology, prehistory. Rev. ed. Berkeley: The Regents of the University of California; 2000. p. 337–65.
    1. Bellwood P. Prehistory of the Indo-Malaysian Archipelago revised ed. Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press; 1997.
    1. Greenhill SJ, Drummond AJ, Gray RD. How accurate and robust are the phylogenetic estimates of Austronesian language relationships? PloS one. 2010;5(3):e9573 PubMed Central PMCID: PMC2835747. 10.1371/journal.pone.0009573 - DOI - PMC - PubMed

Publication types

LinkOut - more resources