Our Footprints On The Sands Of Time

"We have analyzed whole-genome sequences of humans and have shown that all Asian and Pacific populations share a single origin and expansion out of Africa, contradicting an earlier proposal of two independent waves of migration. We have also shown that populations from South and Southeast Asia harbour a small proportion of ancestry from an unknown extinct hominin, and this ancestry is absent from Europeans and East Asians.

The contemporary social structure of Indian populations is characterized by endogamy with different degrees of porosity. This has resulted in considerable genetic diversity and local genetic differences within India. By performing a systematic analysis of genome-wide data, we have shown that there are four major ancestries in mainland India. This contrasts with an earlier inference of two ancestries based on limited population sampling. A distinct ancestry of the populations of Andaman archipelago was identified and found to be co-ancestral to Oceanic populations."