Abstract
The Roma population is a European ethnic minority characterized by recent and multiple dispersals and founder effects. After their origin in South Asia around 1,500 years ago, they migrated West. In Europe, they diverged into ethnolinguistically distinct migrant groups that spread across the continent. Previous genetic studies based on genome-wide data and uniparental markers detected Roma founder events and West-Eurasian gene flow. However, to the best of our knowledge, it has not been assessed whether these demographic processes have equally affected both sexes in the population. The present study uses the largest and most comprehensive dataset of complete mitochondrial and Y chromosome Roma sequences to unravel the sex-biased patterns that have shaped their genetic history. The results show that the Roma maternal genetic pool carries a higher lineage diversity from South Asia, as opposed to a single paternal South Asian lineage. Nonetheless, the European gene flow events mainly occurred through the maternal lineages; however, a signal of this gene flow is also traceable in the paternal lineages. We also detect a higher female migration rate among European Roma groups. Altogether, these results suggest that sociocultural factors influenced the emergence of sex-biased genetic patterns at global and local scales in the Roma population through time.
Highlights
The Roma population is a European ethnic minority characterized by recent and multiple dispersals and founder effects
These asymmetric processes can be traced at local and regional levels, their footprint is less evident at a global scale[11,12], as seen in multiple genetic studies from a wide range of human populations: Madagascar shows a different geographic distribution for the maternal and paternal source of Indonesian ancestry[13]; gene flow in South and Central American populations appears to be mediated by paternal European lineages and maternal Native American and African o nes[14,15,16]; in Thailand, female dispersal rate is higher than male in patrilocal groups, whereas, in matrilocal populations, an equal exchange is o bserved[17]
South Asian lineages are more frequent in the male-specific portion of the Y chromosome (MSY) than in the mtDNA sequences (49% and 25%, respectively), whereas mtDNA has a higher proportion of West Eurasian lineages compared to MSY
Summary
The Roma population is a European ethnic minority characterized by recent and multiple dispersals and founder effects. The comparison of mtDNA and the male-specific portion of the Y chromosome (MSY) is of special interest in order to reveal sex-biased genetic patterns in human p opulations[10], since parameters contributing to population evolution such as generation time, migration rates and admixture can contribute differently to the two non-recombining markers[9] These asymmetric processes can be traced at local and regional levels, their footprint is less evident at a global scale[11,12], as seen in multiple genetic studies from a wide range of human populations: Madagascar shows a different geographic distribution for the maternal and paternal source of Indonesian ancestry[13]; gene flow in South and Central American populations appears to be mediated by paternal European lineages and maternal Native American and African o nes[14,15,16]; in Thailand, female dispersal rate is higher than male in patrilocal groups, whereas, in matrilocal populations, an equal exchange is o bserved[17]. The scope, timespan and potential impact on their genetic landscape have not been characterized yet at a larger scale
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