Biological Linkage of Ancient and Modern Populations of Northwestern Pakistan through their Mitochondrial Profiles
Biological Linkage of Ancient and Modern Populations of Northwestern Pakistan through their Mitochondrial Profiles
Nasir Ali1,2,6, Muhammad Ilyas2,3, Nazia Akbar1,2*, Gohar Rahman2, Shakirullah Khan4, Mujaddad Ur Rehman6, Abdul Samad5, Habib Ahmad1,2 and Bibi Nazia Murtaza7*
ABSTRACT
Molecular anthropology is a new feature of archeology that can provide additional useful information to illustrate our past. Ancient DNA basically had small pieces of DNA that has been around for a long time. This DNA can be used as a sample to study different parts of a population that lived a long time ago. In order to study the continuity in maternal lineage between ancient and modern people of the north-western province, polymorphisms in the HVSI region of mitochondrial DNA sequences of 56 ancient samples (1000-3000 old) and 303 modern samples from three different regions (Chitral, Swat and Hazara) were analyzed for hyper variable sequences of mitochondrial DNA for the determination of their maternal affinities. Our results revealed 25% unique haplotypes in ancient samples whereas 28% unique haplotypes have been observed in the modern samples. The most frequent haplotype found was H2a (23% in ancient and 10% in modern samples). Our results show that with the exception of ancient Dir, there are genetic similarities among the ancient lines between Hazara, Chitral and Swat. It revealed that most of the ancient and modern samples belong to the H subclades. Current studies have revealed a significant genetic link between ancient and modern peoples of northwestern Pakistan. Our findings regarding maternal lineages of the people of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, presumed in mtDNA, has their origin from the West Eurasian and South Asian stocks. These results we have offer a reference to better understand the biological linkage of ancient and modern inhabitants living in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Pakistan.
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