Izvorni znanstveni članak
Alu Insertions in the Iberian Peninsula and North West Africa – Genetic Boundaries or Melting Pot?
Emili González-Pérez
Marc Via
Esther Esteban
Antoni López-Alomar
Stéphane Mazieres
Nourdin Harich
Mostafa Kandil
Jean-Michel Dugoujon
Pedro Moral
Sažetak
The Western Mediterranean Basin joins a set of ethnically different populations as
Iberians and Basques in the North shore and Berbers and Arab-speakers in the South
one. In spite of this differentiation, they have maintained historical contacts since ancient
times. The existence of a possible common genetic background (specially for Berbers
and Iberians) together with the genetic impact of the Islamic occupation of the Iberian
Peninsula during 7 centuries are some of the intriguing anthropological questions
that have been studied in this area using several classical and DNA markers. The aim
of this work is to present the results on a survey of polymorphic Alu elements in 10 human
populations of the Western Mediterranean. Recent Alu subfamilies include a significant
number of polymorphic Alu insertions in humans. The polymorphic Alu elements
are neutral genetic markers of identical descent with known ancestral states.
This fact turns Alu insertions into useful markers for the study of human population genetics.
A total number of 14 Alu insertions were analyzed in 5 Iberian populations, 3
Berber groups from North-Western Africa, an Arab-speaker population from Morocco
and a sub-Saharan ethnic group from Ivory Coast. The results of this study allow the
genetic characterization of Berber populations, which show a certain degree of differentiation
from Arab-speaking groups of the same geographic area. Furthermore, a closer
genetic distance between South Spain and Moroccan Berbers as compared with other
Spanish samples supports a major genetic influx consistent with some (but not all) previous
genetic studies on populations from the two shores of the Gibraltar Straits.
Ključne riječi
Alu elements; polymorphisms; Iberian populations; Berber populations
Hrčak ID:
28169
URI
Datum izdavanja:
15.12.2003.
Posjeta: 1.563 *