Afro‐derived Brazilian populations: Male genetic constitution estimated by Y‐chromosomes STRs and AluYAP element polymorphisms

Abstract

The genetic constitution of Afro-derived Brazilian populations is barely studied. To improve that knowledge, we investigated the AluYAP element and five Y-chromosome STRs (DYS19, DYS390, DYS391, DYS392, and DYS393) to estimate ethnic male contribution in the constitution of four Brazilian quilombos remnants: Mocambo, Rio das Rãs, Kalunga, and Riacho de Sacutiaba. Results indicated significant differences among communities, corroborating historical information about the Brazilian settlement. We concluded that besides African contribution, there was a great European participation in the constitution of these four populations and that observed haplotype variability could be explained by gene flow to quilombos remnants and mutational events in microsatellites (STRs).

Male ancestry structure and interethnic admixture in African‐descent communities from the Amazon as revealed by Y‐chromosome Strs

“…The African‐descent population from the Amazon showed a high European male contribution (average of 41%), contrasting with a low Amerindian contribution (5%). Reduced Amerindian male contribution, inferred from Y‐DNA polymorphisms in African‐descent populations from South America, was previously reported (Bortolini et al, 1999; Yunis et al, 2005; Domingues et al, 2007; Gonzáles‐Andrade et al, 2009; Ribeiro et al, 2009) and depicted an interesting demographic phenomenon when compared to the high Amerindian female contribution in those African‐descent populations, based on mtDNA data. The average female African and Amerindian contributions reported were high (50.3% and 46.6%, respectively), while European contribution was very low (1.3%) (Carvalho et al, 2008).…”

“…The most frequent haplotypes are likely to be the founding haplotypes of a population (Ribeiro et al, 2009), becoming a robust inference the more isolated a population is, e.g., the African‐descent communities from Amazonia. Moreover, the known worldwide distribution of these putative founding haplotypes allows evaluating the geographic origin of recent populations.…”

Interethnic admixture and the evolution of Latin American populations

“…1Additional information based on uniparental or X-linked markers can be found as follows: (a) mtDNA only: Carvalho et al (2008); (b) mtDNA plus Y-chromosome: RibeirodosSantos et al (2002), Marrero et al (2005, 2007), Hünemeier et al (2007), Guerreiro-Junior et al (2009); (c) Y-chromosome only: Carvalho-Silva et al (2001), Ferreira et al (2006), Silva et al (2006), Ribeiro et al (2009), Carvalho et al (2010), Palha et al (2011), Ribeiro et al (2011), Francez et al (2012); (d) X-linked only: Ribeiro-Rodrigues et al (2009), Resque et al (2010).2Key to sampling criteria: 1. Random; 2.…”

Y‐Linked microsatellites in Amazonian Amerindians applied to ancestry estimates in Brazilian Afro‐derived populations

“…These communities were settled mainly in Northeastern Brazil (Fundação Cultural Palmares; http://www.palmares.gov.br/). Although some of these quilombo remnant communities were previously studied with Y‐linked microsatellites (Palha et al, ; Ribeiro et al, ) and biallelic markers (Abe‐Sandes et al, ), further genetic studies on these communities are warranted since they might represent the African gene pool that took part into the formation of Brazilian extant populations.…”

“…According to some historical and genetic data, the formation of some quilombo remnant communities was a heterogeneous process that included not only people of African origin, but also Amerindians and European subjects (Abe‐Sandes et al, ; Arpini‐Sampaio et al, ; Barbosa et al, ; Bortolini et al, ; Da Silva et al, ; Doria and Carvalho, ; Ribeiro et al, ). To assess the genetic constitution of these present day Afro‐derived communities, proper ancestral allele frequencies are required to generate reliable ancestry estimates, as pointed out elsewhere (Sans, ).…”