Diversity and Structure of Mitochondrial Gene Pools of Slavs in the Ethnogenetic Aspect

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Data on the variability of the nucleotide sequences of whole mitochondrial genomes in populations of Russians, Poles, and Serbs, which represent, respectively, the groups of East, West, and South Slavs, are reviewed in comparison with similar data for other European peoples. It was shown that the results of the analysis of the variability of whole mitogenomes make it possible to substantially detail the ideas about the structure and diversity of mitochondrial gene pools obtained earlier with other approaches, e.g., analysis of the distribution of haplotypes of mtDNA major noncoding region or the frequencies of mitochondrial haplogroups. It has been demonstrated that Bayesian analysis of large data sets on the variability of whole mitogenomes in the Slavs enabled the identification of between-regional differences in the dynamics of the effective population size over time for Europe. The use of a phylogeographic analysis of modern and paleogenomic data on the variability of whole mitogenomes makes it possible to define unique phylogenetic mtDNA clusters specific to certain ethnic groups and their communities. Their common genetic origin, which dates back to the Bronze and Iron Ages, is demonstrated on the example of three ethnic groups of Slavs.