Athapaskan Migration To Southwest Illuminated With Y Chromosome Study

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              Geronimo, a well-known military leader of the Chiricahua
              Apache in New Mexico, may have been a descendant of
              subarctic Athapaskan immigrants.

              (Credit: Library of Congress. Photo by Edward S. Curtis.)









                     Athapaskan Migration To Southwest U.S. Illuminated With Y Chromosome Study






ScienceDaily
(July 21, 2008) —

A large-scale genetic study of native North Americans offers new insights into the migration of a small
group of Athapaskan natives from their subarctic home in northwest North America to the southwestern
United States.

The migration, which left no known archaeological trace, is believed to have occurred about 500 years ago.

The study, led by researchers at the University of Illinois, is detailed this month in the American Journal of
Physical Anthropology. It relied on a genetic analysis of the Y chromosome and so offers a window on the
unique ancestral history of the male Athapaskan migrants. Previous genetic studies of this group focused
on mitochondrial DNA, which is passed down exclusively from mothers to their offspring.

The new findings reinforce the hypothesis that the Athapaskan migration involved a relatively small group
that nonetheless was very successful at assimilating and intermixing with native groups already living in the southwest. The newcomers were so influential that the Athapaskan language family now dominates many
parts of the Southwest. Now called Apacheans, the Navajo and Apache descendants of the early migrants
are dispersed throughout the central Southwest and speak languages closely related to the Chipewyan, an Athapaskan language found in the subarctic.

(Language studies also revealed that Athapaskans migrated to the northwest U.S. and settled on the coast
in parts of California and Oregon.)

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How the Athapaskan migrants were able to spread their language -- and genes -- so successfully
is unknown. Anthropologists note that the migrants probably arrived in the Southwest at a time of
stress among indigenous groups as a result of an extended drought.

The new study also revealed how pervasively European males intermixed with native groups, said
principal investigator Ripan Malhi, a molecular anthropologist in the department of anthropology at
Illinois.

"A lot of the Y chromosomes have been replaced by European males," he said.

Malhi and his colleagues looked at specific regions on the Y chromosome that can vary from person
to person. Tiny differences in the sequence of nucleotides that spell out the genetic code can be
used to determine whether -- and how closely -- individuals are related to one another. Those who
share many of these genetic signatures are more likely to share a recent common ancestor than
those who don't.

The researchers analyzed 724 Y chromosomes from 26 native populations in North America.

By including groups from across the continent (they studied tribes from Alaska to the Yucatan Penin-
sula and eastward to Hudson Bay and southeast U.S.), the researchers were able to analyze genetic
differences among many native groups and to get an idea of the degree of European male infiltration
into the native gene pool.

Consistent with a previous study of native North American mitochondrial DNA (also led by Malhi),
the new analysis found a pattern that indicates that a small group of subarctic Athapaskans
migrated to the Southwest. This pattern is reflected in the fact that many Apacheans carry the
genetic signature of a small subset of subarctic Athapaskans.

These findings also affirm an earlier study of variants of a particular protein, albumin, in different
native groups. That study showed that while many Apacheans carried an albumin variant common
among natives in the Southwest and Mesoamerica, some Apacheans were the only ones to carry
a variant that also occurs in subarctic populations.

Other patterns emerged from the Y chromosome analysis. One genetic signature associated with
European males was detected in native males throughout North America, but was found at the
highest frequency in groups living nearest to Hudson Bay, where trade between Europeans and
the region's indigenous peoples was established in the early 17th century.

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The new study, along with the earlier genetic and protein studies and the language analyses,
is filling a gap in the archaeological record of Athapaskan migration, Malhi said.

This gap is the result of the fact that the Athapaskan migrants seem not to have altered the
physical landscape, architecture or cultural practices of the populations they assimilated in the
southwest U.S.

The only lasting evidence of the Athapaskan migration found so far is in their language and their
genes, Malhi said.

"We're fitting together different lines of evidence," he said. "We're not just using the genetic data.
We're using it in combination with the linguistic, oral histories from elders in the community and
archaeological data. And even though there has been over a century of archaeological research
done in the Southwest, there's not much information there about the Athapaskan migration into
the Southwest."

The team also included researchers from the Universidad Nacional Autonoma de Mexico, the University
of California at Davis, Washington State University, the University of Montana, the University of Arizona
and Trace Genetics.


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Adapted from materials provided by University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, via EurekAlert!,
a service of AAAS.
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 MLA University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (2008, July 21). Athapaskan Migration To Southwest U.S. Illuminated With Y Chromosome Study. ScienceDaily. Retrieved November 12, 2008, from



http://www.sciencedaily.com­ /releases/2008/07/080715104932.htm

[Boreas]

Anything on WHAT European male and female DNA-signatures (English, French, Spanish, etc.) that have ben melting in?

[Bianca]

Boreas:


Search here:



http://www.sciencedaily.com­

[Boreas]

Great site - but me not find nothing about the male markers of the Atapaskan or the Apanches. Anoyone have a clue?

[Bianca]

Boreas, I spend an awful lot of time at sciencedaily.com.

Their search is very poor, but they have terrific information if you just keep clicking
around. Eventually, I always find what I am after.

Try this:


http://www.sciencedaily.com/search/?keyword=dna


Click on all the RED column items on the LEFT

Also, on the BLUE  ITEMS immediadely above and across.

I am not 'into' DNA, so my help is limited.

GOOD LUCK!!