The Simons Genome Diversity Project: 300 Genomes from 142 Diverse Populations

• NCJ Number: 252320
• Journal: Nature Volume: 538 Issue: 7624 Dated: October 2016 Pages: 201.-206
• Author(s): Swapan Mallick; Heng Li; Mark Lipson; Iain Mathieson; Melissa Gymrek; Fernando Racimo; Mengyao Zhao; Ninj Chennagin
• Date Published: October 2016
• Length: 6 pages
• Grant Number(s): 2014-DN-BX-K089
• Agencies: NIJ-Sponsored
• Publication Type: Research (Applied/Empirical); Report (Study/Research); Report (Grant Sponsored); Program/Project Description
• Award: Robust STR calling from High-throughput Sequencing Technologies

Annotation

This article reports on the Simons Genome Diversity Project data set, which consists of high-quality genomes of 300 individuals from 142 diverse populations.

Abstract

These genomes include at least 5.8 million base pairs that are not present in the human reference genome. The current analysis identified key features of the landscape of human genome variation, including that the rate of accumulation of mutations has accelerated by about 5 percent in non-Africans compared to Africans since divergence. This analysis shows that the ancestors of some pairs of present-day human populations were substantially separated by 100,000 years ago, well before the archaeologically attested onset of behavioral modernity. The analysis also indicates that indigenous Australians, New Guineans, and Andamanese do not derive substantial ancestry from an early dispersal of modern humans; instead, their modern human ancestry is consistent with coming from the same source as that of other non-Africans. 45 references (Publisher abstract modified)