Genomic evidence for shared common ancestry of East African hunting-gathering populations and insights into local adaptation

Scheinfeldt, L. B., Soi, S., Lambert, C., Ko, W. Y., Coulibaly, A., Ranciaro, A., Thompson, S., Hirbo, J., Beggs, W., Ibrahim, M., Nyambo, T., Omar, S., Woldemeskel, D., Belay, G., Froment, A., Kim, J., Tishkoff, S. A. (March 2019) Genomic evidence for shared common ancestry of East African hunting-gathering populations and insights into local adaptation. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A, 116 (10). pp. 4166-4175. ISSN 0027-8424

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URL: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/30782801
DOI: 10.1073/pnas.1817678116

Abstract

Anatomically modern humans arose in Africa approximately 300,000 years ago, but the demographic and adaptive histories of African populations are not well-characterized. Here, we have generated a genome-wide dataset from 840 Africans, residing in western, eastern, southern, and northern Africa, belonging to 50 ethnicities, and speaking languages belonging to four language families. In addition to agriculturalists and pastoralists, our study includes 16 populations that practice, or until recently have practiced, a hunting-gathering (HG) lifestyle. We observe that genetic structure in Africa is broadly correlated not only with geography, but to a lesser extent, with linguistic affiliation and subsistence strategy. Four East African HG (EHG) populations that are geographically distant from each other show evidence of common ancestry: the Hadza and Sandawe in Tanzania, who speak languages with clicks classified as Khoisan; the Dahalo in Kenya, whose language has remnant clicks; and the Sabue in Ethiopia, who speak an unclassified language. Additionally, we observed common ancestry between central African rainforest HGs and southern African San, the latter of whom speak languages with clicks classified as Khoisan. With the exception of the EHG, central African rainforest HGs, and San, other HG groups in Africa appear genetically similar to neighboring agriculturalist or pastoralist populations. We additionally demonstrate that infectious disease, immune response, and diet have played important roles in the adaptive landscape of African history. However, while the broad biological processes involved in recent human adaptation in Africa are often consistent across populations, the specific loci affected by selective pressures more often vary across populations.

Item Type: Paper
Subjects: bioinformatics
bioinformatics > genomics and proteomics > genetics & nucleic acid processing
bioinformatics > genomics and proteomics
evolution
organism description > animal > mammal > primates > hominids
organism description > animal > mammal > primates > hominids > human
organism description > animal > mammal
bioinformatics > genomics and proteomics > genetics & nucleic acid processing > population genetics
organism description > animal > mammal > primates
CSHL Authors:
Depositing User: Matthew Dunn
Date: March 2019
Date Deposited: 25 Mar 2019 14:48
Last Modified: 02 Feb 2024 20:35
PMCID: PMC6410815
Related URLs:
URI: https://repository.cshl.edu/id/eprint/37746

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