Comprehensive view of the population history of Arabia as inferred by mtDNA variation

Objectives: Genetic and archaeological research supports the theory that Arabia was the first region traversed by modern humans as they left Africa and dispersed throughout Eurasia. However, the role of Arabia from the initial migration out of Africa until more recent times is still unclear.

Materials and methods: We have generated 379 new hypervariable segment 1 (HVS-1) sequences from a range of geographic locations throughout Yemen. We compare these data to published HVS-1 sequences representing Arabia and neighboring regions to build a unique dataset of 186 populations and 14,290 sequences.

Results: We identify 4,563 haplotypes unevenly distributed across Arabia and neighboring regions. Arabia contains higher proportions of shared haplotypes than the regions with which it shares these haplotypes, suggesting high levels of migration through the region. Populations in Arabia show higher levels of population expansion than those in East Africa, but lower levels than the Near East, Middle East or India. Arabian populations also show very high levels of genetic variation that overlaps with variation from most other regions.

Conclusion: We take a population genetics approach to provide a comprehensive view of the relationships of Arabian and neighboring populations. We show that Arabian populations share closest links to the Near East and North Africa, but have a more ancient origin with slower demographic growth and/or lower migration rates. Our conclusions are supported by phylogenetic studies but also suggest that recent migrations have erased signals of earlier events.