From DNA Analysis, Clues to a Single Australian Migration

NY Times ^ | May 8, 2007 | NICHOLAS WADE

[neverdem]

Geneticists re-examining the first settlement of Australia and Papua-New Guinea by modern humans have concluded that the two islands were reached some 50,000 years ago by a single group of people who remained in substantial or total isolation until recent times. The finding, if upheld, would undermine assumptions that there have been subsequent waves of migration into Australia.

Analyzing old and new samples of Aborigine DNA, which are hard to obtain because of governmental restrictions, the geneticists developed a detailed picture of the aborigines’ ancestry, as reflected in their Y chromosomes, found just in men, and their mitochondrial DNA, a genetic element passed down just through the mother.

The results show that Aborigines and the people of Papua-New Guinea share several ancient genetic lineages, indicating that both are descended from a single founding population.

All Australian Aborigines, at least to judge by the genetic samples in hand, are descended from this founding population, meaning that no further immigrants reached Australia in numbers large enough to leave a genetic trace until the modern era.

The findings, by Toomas Kisivild and a group of geneticists and archaeologists situated mostly at the University of Cambridge in England, are reported today in The Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

The oldest human remains from Australia, about 45,000 years in age, have quite thin or gracile bones, whereas fossils from 20,000 years ago are robust. The new findings suggest that the difference must stem from some internal process like adaptation to climatic change, and not to interbreeding with the archaic species Homo erectus, as some have suggested...

[neverdem]

NY Times

[Jedi Master Pikachu]

Sahul ping.

[blam]

Aborigines Came Out Of Africa, Study Shows

[Ditter]

Never heard of Sahul, would this include New Zealand? Are the Maori included in this group of people?

[usafsk]

Different line. Maori are Polynesians who arrived in New Zealand sometime around 800 AD in a series of immigration waves.

[Jedi Master Pikachu]

Sahul was a continent during the Ice Age (when ocean levels were lower). It comprised what today is Australia, New Guinea, and Tasmania (and land in between). New Zealand was not part of Sahul.

[SunkenCiv]

Thanks NeverDem.

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[neverdem]

Thanks for the link.

[blam]

Maori Men And Women From Different Homelands

[neverdem]

Never heard of Sahul, would this include New Zealand? Are the Maori included in this group of people?

I never heard of Sahul either before this story.

Maori Origins

Gene mutation may no longer protect certain populations from alcoholism

Since I already knew about that mutation, I find the first link somewhat convincing.

[blam]

They're mean too.

Violence Is Blamed On 'Warrior Gene' In The Maoris

[neverdem]

A mean gene? Thanks for the link.

[SunkenCiv]

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