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* Laboratory of Molecular Systematics and Evolution, University of
Arizona, Tucson, AZ 85721; ¶ Department of Genetics,
Università degli Studi di Pavia, Pavia 27100, Italy;
Communicated by Arno G. Motulsky, University of Washington,
Seattle, WA, March 15, 2000 (received for review November 17, 1999)
Haplotypes constructed from Y-chromosome markers were used to trace
the paternal origins of the Jewish Diaspora. A set of 18 biallelic
polymorphisms was genotyped in 1,371 males from 29 populations,
including 7 Jewish (Ashkenazi, Roman, North African, Kurdish, Near
Eastern, Yemenite, and Ethiopian) and 16 non-Jewish groups from similar
geographic locations. The Jewish populations were characterized by a
diverse set of 13 haplotypes that were also present in non-Jewish
populations from Africa, Asia, and Europe. A series of analyses was
performed to address whether modern Jewish Y-chromosome diversity
derives mainly from a common Middle Eastern source population or from
admixture with neighboring non-Jewish populations during and after the
Diaspora. Despite their long-term residence in different countries and
isolation from one another, most Jewish populations were not
significantly different from one another at the genetic level.
Admixture estimates suggested low levels of European Y-chromosome gene
flow into Ashkenazi and Roman Jewish communities. A multidimensional
scaling plot placed six of the seven Jewish populations in a relatively
tight cluster that was interspersed with Middle Eastern non-Jewish
populations, including Palestinians and Syrians. Pairwise
differentiation tests further indicated that these Jewish and Middle
Eastern non-Jewish populations were not statistically different. The
results support the hypothesis that the paternal gene pools of Jewish
communities from Europe, North Africa, and the Middle East descended
from a common Middle Eastern ancestral population, and suggest that most Jewish communities have remained relatively isolated from neighboring non-Jewish communities during and after the Diaspora.
Medical Sciences
Jewish and Middle Eastern non-Jewish populations share a common
pool of Y-chromosome biallelic haplotypes
,
,,,
,,, and Hadassah Medical School, Hebrew University of Jerusalem,
Jerusalem 91120, Israel; ** Department of Genetics, University of
Leicester, Leicester LE1 7RH, England; SAMIR,
University of Witwatersrand, Johannesburg 2000, South Africa;
Department of Pediatrics, New York University Medical
Center, New York, NY 10016; and § Department of Human
Genetics, Sackler School of Medicine, Ramat Aviv 69978, Israel
M.F.H., A.J.R., and E.T.W. contributed equally to
this work.
To whom reprint requests should be addressed at:
Laboratory of Molecular Systematics and Evolution, Biosciences West
Room 239, University of Arizona, Tucson, AZ 85721. E-mail:
mhammer{at}u.arizona.edu.
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