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Genetic variations and forensic characteristics of Han Chinese population residing in the Pearl River Delta revealed by 23 autosomal STRs

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Abstract

Pearl River Delta, known as the Chinese “South Gate”, locates adjacent to Hong Kong and Macao, and across the sea from the Southeast Asian region. Herein, 4325 unrelated Han Chinese individuals residing in the Pearl River Delta region were recruited and genotyped with 23 autosomal STRs (the expanded CODIS core loci plus D6S1043, Penta D and Penta E). No evidence of deviation from Hardy–Weinberg equilibrium after Bonferroni correction was observed. The combined match probability and combined power of exclusion were 1.7829 × 10−28 and 0.9999999996, respectively. Next, population comparisons among ethnically, linguistically, and geographically diverse populations (11 Chinese populations based on genotypes of same 23 autosomal STRs, 46 Chinese nationwide populations based on allele frequency distributions of 19 autosomal STRs and 51 worldwide populations on the basis of 20 autosomal STRs) were performed via Structure, MDS, PCA and neighbor-joining tree. Genetic heterogeneities among Chinese nationalities along ethno-linguistic boundaries (Turkic-speaking, Tibeto-Burman-speaking, and Chinese-speaking populations) and geographic divisions (North-Han and South-Han) have been illustrated by first two autosomal microsatellite datasets. The results from worldwide population genetic relationship exploration based on 20 autosomal STRs demonstrated that genetic affinity has existed within ethnical and geographical close populations.

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Acknowledgements

We would like to thank the volunteers who contributed samples for this study. This study was supported by grants from the National Natural Science Foundation of China (81571854 and 81501635) the Open Project of Key Laboratory of Forensic Genetics in Ministry of Public Security (2017FGKFKT01) and the Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities (20826041A4408, YJ201651 and 2012017yjsy187).

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  1. Guanglin He and Zheng Wang have contributed equally to this work and should be considered as co-first authors.

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Institute of Forensic Medicine, West China School of Basic Medical Sciences and Forensic Medicine, Sichuan University, Chengdu, 610041, Sichuan, China

    Guanglin He, Zheng Wang, Mengge Wang, Jing Liu, Shouyu Wang & Yiping Hou

  2. Department of Forensic Medicine, College of Basic Medicine, Chongqing Medical University, Chongqing, 400016, China

    Xing Zou

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  1. Guanglin He
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Correspondence to Yiping Hou.

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He, G., Wang, Z., Wang, M. et al. Genetic variations and forensic characteristics of Han Chinese population residing in the Pearl River Delta revealed by 23 autosomal STRs. Mol Biol Rep 45, 1125–1133 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11033-018-4264-y

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11033-018-4264-y

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