Forensic and genetic characterizations of diverse southern Thai populations based on 15 autosomal STRs

Abstract

Southern Thailand is home to various populations; the Moklen, Moken and Urak Lawoi’ sea nomads and Maniq negrito are the minority, while the southern Thai groups (Buddhist and Muslim) are the majority. Although previous studies have generated forensic STR dataset for major groups, such data of the southern Thai minority have not been included; here we generated a regional forensic database of southern Thailand. We newly genotyped common 15 autosomal STRs in 184 unrelated southern Thais, including all minorities and majorities. When combined with previously published data of major southern Thais, this provides a total of 334 southern Thai samples. The forensic parameter results show appropriate values for personal identification and paternity testing; the probability of excluding paternity is 0.99999622, and the combined discrimination power is 0.999999999999999. Probably driven by genetic drift and/or isolation with small census size, we found genetic distinction of the Maniq and sea nomads from the major groups, which were closer to the Malay and central Thais than the other Thai groups. The allelic frequency results can strength the regional forensic database in southern Thailand and also provide useful information for anthropological perspective.

Molecular epidemiology and hematological profiles of hemoglobin variants in southern Thailand

“…Minor ethnic groups were observed in the northern population, including Lawa, Mon, Shan, Yuan, Khuen, Lue, and Yong 32 . By contrast, the minority ethnic groups in the southern population are Thai Muslims, Maniq, Moken, Moklen, and Urak Lawoi 33 . Furthermore, the mitochondrial phylogenetic analysis revealed that the population from the northern area has distinct haplotype groups compared to those of the southern population 34 .…”

South Asian maternal and paternal lineages in southern Thailand and the role of sex-biased admixture

“…The 46 genomic DNA samples (23 for southern Thai_TK and 23 for southern Thai_AN) were from previous studies [ 15 , 30 ]. For southern Thai_TK, there are 20 males and 3 females but all 23 southern Thai_AN donors are females.…”