Distinguishing three distinct biogeographic regions with an in‐house developed 39‐AIM‐InDel panel and further admixture proportion estimation for Uyghurs

• DOI: 10.1002/elps.201800448
• Publication Date: 2019-02-13T14:01:26Z
• Authors: Qiong Lan; Chunmei Shen; Xiaoye Jin; Yuxin Guo; Tong Xie; Chong Chen; Wei Cui; Yating Fang; Guang Yang; Bofeng Zhu
• Keywords: Genetic Markers; 0301 basic medicine; Forensic Sciences; Racial Groups; Black People; Polymorphism, Single Nucleotide; White People; 03 medical and health sciences; Genetics, Population; Asian People; Gene Frequency; INDEL Mutation; Humans

AbstractIn the forensic field, ancestry‐informative markers (AIMs) showing remarkable allele frequency discrepancies can be useful in deducing the likely ancestral origin of a person or estimating the ancestry component proportions of an admixed population or individual. Diallelic single nucleotide polymorphisms are genetic markers commonly used for ancestry inference, but the genotyping methods of single nucleotide polymorphisms fail to fulfil the demands of cost‐effectiveness and simplicity of experimental manipulation. To overcome the limitations, a 39 ancestry‐informative insertion/deletion polymorphism multiplex panel was developed in the present study to perform ancestry assignment of individuals from three distinct biogeographic regions (Africa, Europe, East Asia). And in the panel design, we also attempted to incorporate AIM‐insertion/deletion polymorphisms exhibiting allelic frequency differences in Han, Uyghur, and Tibetan populations into the multiplex assay, further expecting to provide valuable information for refining ancestry inference within Chinese populations. Statistical analyses were performed to estimate efficiency of this panel in clustering individuals from three continents mentioned above into their corresponding populations, which indicated the potential of the panel in ancestry inference. Besides, we also estimated the ancestral component proportions of Uyghur group and STRUCTURE analysis revealed that Uyghurs from Urumchi city of northern Xinjiang exhibited a distinctly admixed pattern of East Asian and European ancestry components with a ratio of 49:44, reflecting the relatively higher East Asian ancestry component contribution in the gene pool of the Uyghur group.