Unmasking AIT

[Husky]

1. A new paper that says significant R1aZ93 diversification within India is itself already dated 4000-4500 years before present (note: haven't read the paper - no access - but the blurb makes no mention of R1aZ93 "entering" India for its first time in this very period, plus the implication of what they say is that Z93 has at least some longer presence in India than the age of the Indian-specific sublineages that result from Z93's diversification date). Meaning: some R1aZ93 itself already ought to have been in India before this period (if not it and its ancestral lineage being ancient and native: the blurb says nothing to discount that). The lower end of the date itself rules out Srubna and later Andronovo, which are 1800 BCE and later. And the range rules out Sintashta too 2100-1800 BCE. More importantly, all Sintashta and ALL the steppes are ruled out because the computational brain Patterson took one look at the steppe data (which had already been gathered in 2014, apparently) and ruled out steppe origins for Indics (and Armenians) altogether. And Patterson** would know better than anyone else what the data is saying.







nature.com/ng/journal/vaop/ncurrent/full/ng.3559.html

Punctuated bursts in human male demography inferred from 1,244 worldwide Y-chromosome sequences

Submitted 08 November 2015

Accepted 01 April 2016

Published online 25 April 2016



Poznik GD1,2, Xue Y3, Mendez FL2, Willems TF4,5, Massaia A3, Wilson Sayres MA6,7, Ayub Q3, McCarthy SA3, Narechania A8, Kashin S9, Chen Y3, Banerjee R3, Rodriguez-Flores JL10, Cerezo M3, Shao H11, Gymrek M5,12, Malhotra A13, Louzada S3, Desalle R8, Ritchie GR3,14, Cerveira E13, Fitzgerald TW3, Garrison E3, Marcketta A15, Mittelman D16,17, Romanovitch M13, Zhang C13, Zheng-Bradley X14, Abecasis GR18, McCarroll SA19, Flicek P14, Underhill PA2, Coin L11, Zerbino DR14, Yang F3, Lee C13,20, Clarke L14, Auton A15, Erlich Y5,21,22, Handsaker RE9,19; 1000 Genomes Project Consortium, Bustamante CD2,23, Tyler-Smith C3.

Abstract

We report the sequences of 1,244 human Y chromosomes randomly ascertained from 26 worldwide populations by the 1000 Genomes Project. We discovered more than 65,000 variants, including single-nucleotide variants, multiple-nucleotide variants, insertions and deletions, short tandem repeats, and copy number variants. Of these, copy number variants contribute the greatest predicted functional impact. We constructed a calibrated phylogenetic tree on the basis of binary single-nucleotide variants and projected the more complex variants onto it, estimating the number of mutations for each class. Our phylogeny shows bursts of extreme expansion in male numbers that have occurred independently among each of the five continental superpopulations examined, at times of known migrations and technological innovations.



....



In South Asia, we detected eight lineage expansions dating to ~4.0–7.3 kya and involving haplogroups H1-M52, L-M11, and R1a-Z93 (Supplementary Fig. 14b,d,e). The most striking were expansions within R1a-Z93, occurring 4.0–4.5 kya. This time predates by a few centuries the collapse of the Indus Valley Civilization, associated by some with the historical migration of Indo-European speakers from the Western Steppe into the Indian subcontinent 27. There is a notable parallel with events in Europe, and future aDNA evidence may prove to be as informative as it has been in Europe.

Consequently, euro steppist amateur geneticists, who were pushing really hard for Sintashta or even later Andronovo origins for R1aZ93 in India (maybe hoping to retain Srubna as a final possibility) have now fallen back to clutching at the steppe's Poltavka outlier - dated 2925-2536 calBCE - as their last ditch hope for deriving Indian Z93/Z94 from the steppes.

The Poltavka outlier was R1aZ94, itself a derivative of R1aZ93. Both Z93 and Z94 subclades of R1a were deliberately dated very late by some, with Z94 obviously later since it's derived from Z93. But the dates for both have had to be pushed back further repeatedly, such as because of the Poltavka outlier being Z94 and because Reich & co. are expected to come out with an R1a dated pre-3000 BCE from Yamna which he appears to have been hoarding (perhaps as his trump card), rumoured to be a Z94. (Though the very author on the Haak - and in time Mathieson - papers who had brought up this R1a, had mentioned a different clade of R1a as per his interview transcript. Amateur geneticists online however chose to re-interpret this as "probably" "actually meaning" Z94.) Don't know when Reich will play his card. But if the Yamna R1a individual evinces the EHG component, it too is ruled out from being a source for "Indo-Aryan" (and Z93). (And if he doesn't evince EHG, then there's something wrong with the Yamna = 50% EHG + 50% CHG model, and more such things, like how it points to that R1a individual being a migrant to the region and not native to the Yamna culture. "Q: What do you call a Yamnayan with no EHG?" "A: A migrant.")







Returning to the 2016 paper, however, it is admittedly not basing itself on Indian aDNA. But it's beyond certain that the authors would have read Haak et al 2015 and Mathieson et al 2015. Note the 2016 paper is submitted on 08 Nov 2015, after Mathieson 2015's final pre-print version and after Mathieson 2015's official online publication in Nature too (both late Oct 2015), which the authors of the 2016 paper would have read for sure. Clearly, they (the authors of the 2016 paper, Poznik et al) were not convinced by any steppe origins of R1aZ93 in Srubna or Andronovo. This is in line with Patterson having ruled out steppe origins of Indics altogether, and Jones et al 2015 following that lead. Besides, and more importantly, Mathieson et al 2015 were only to have analysed data already collected for the Haak paper. At that stage, before Haak et al 2015 was submitted in late 2014, even Maykop aDNA had been collected - as per the admission of Patterson himself**.



** Patterson - background in computation - is now computational biologist, and was in encryption before: working for British intelligence, before being fielded/handed to the US Department of Defence. And they've assigned him to - I mean: he's now volunteered himself for - DNA studies. The man works with big data. It's his thing. Whatever the real reason he's in DNA work now, his brain is factually a wandering computer. Patterson looked at his Haak et al data (analysed later by the Mathieson team for other features, and since they knew they couldn't even conclude Lactase Persistence originated in the steppes - another nonsense dead - they lamely ended with not an origin story but a story about selective forces instead). Again: early on, Patterson looked at the data that had been gathered and drew the most important conclusions, clearly long before anyone else knew what they were looking at.

And if he says, as he certainly did, that Indians (and Armenians) can't be derived from the Hunter Gatherer (presumably EHG) component - that makes up about half of the Yamna genome, and which EHG exists to some extent in *ALL* the steppe kulturs that followed - then that's just final. BTW, Jones et al 2015 - which was submitted after Mathieson 2015 (and more notably, Jones herself had worked on the Mathieson paper, so she'd know the data) - sticks with Patterson's conclusion and likewise foreshadowing their great hope that "Indo-Aryan" languages may perhaps be derivable from Maykop/Caucasus next, because they sure can't be made to derive from the steppes, no matter how much some want it. Oh and to repeat/clarify: Maykop kultur predates the steppes. So if they're hoping "Indo-Aryan" (and Armenian) will derive direct from the Caucasus (Maykop) next, that means steppes can't be "PIE urheimat" (nor speaking PIE...) and steppes can't be source of "Indo-Iranian".



Anyway, so if Patterson says steppes are a no-go, they're a no-go.





sciencedaily.com/releases/2016/04/160425141808.htm

Modern DNA reveals ancient male population explosions linked to migration and technology



Date:

April 25, 2016

Source:

Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute

Summary:

The largest ever study of global genetic variation in the human Y chromosome has uncovered the hidden history of men. Research reveals explosions in male population numbers in five continents, occurring at times between 55 thousand and four thousand years ago.



Analysing the Y chromosomes of modern men can tell us about the lives of our ancestors. The Y chromosome is only passed from father to son and so is wholly linked to male characteristics and behaviours. The team used the data to build a tree of these 1200 Y chromosomes; it shows how they are all related to one another. As expected, they all descend from a single man who lived approximately 190,000 years ago.



The most intriguing and novel finding was that some parts of the tree were more like a bush than a tree, with many branches originating at the same point.



Dr Yali Xue, lead author from the Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute, explained: "This pattern tells us that there was an explosive increase in the number of men carrying a certain type of Y chromosome, within just a few generations. We only observed this phenomenon in males, and only in a few groups of men."



The earliest explosive increases of male numbers occurred 50,000-55,000 years ago, across Asia and Europe, and 15,000 years ago in the Americas. There were also later expansions in sub-Saharan Africa, Western Europe, South Asia and East Asia, at times between 4,000 and 8,000 years ago. The team believes the earlier population increases resulted from the first peopling by modern humans of vast continents, where plenty of resources were available.



The later expansions are more enigmatic.



Dr Chris Tyler-Smith, from the Sanger Institute, added: "The best explanation is that they may have resulted from advances in technology that could be controlled by small groups of men. Wheeled transport, metal working and organised warfare are all candidate explanations that can now be investigated further."

(- Wheeled transport: as per archaeologist Kenoyer, SSVC had toys of wheeled vehicles dated 3500 BCE at the time Yamna was just beginning. And SSVC has wheel track imprints - i.e. SSVC didn't just have toys, they actually used wheeled vehicles.

- Metal working: seen in SSVC, Mehrgarh, to Tepe Hissar etc in Iran.

- Organised warfare: double-edged battle-axes etc were made in SSVC, and also sent from SSVC to Sumer. And Sumer aDNA from early Bronze Age to early Roman period turned out to be Indian-specific.

- See also point 2 below.)



All of the samples and data from the 1000 Genomes Project are freely available for use by other scientists and interested investigators.

2. Also, there's the Indian-specific mtDNA M52 found at an object from a grave at Novosvobodnaya associated with Maykop culture. (Is that object coincidentally the earliest bronze sword found so far and dated some 3 or 4 centuries before 3000 BCE, which was found in a grave at Novosvobodnaya? After all, this surely would be the very first Novosvobodnayan object of the Maykop-era culture that they'd inspect for DNA? And Maykop did "Terrace agriculture": "The longevity of the terraces (more than 5000 years) allows us to consider their builders unsurpassed engineers and craftsmen." <- Isn't that how the wheeled carts and irrigation of the SSVC is described? And bronze bridles. Wonder if Maykop had "Arabian"-like horses, i.e. Sivalensis-derived horses?)



Anyway, besides Indian-specific mtDNA M52 at Maykop, there's some other little details: found in Li et al 2015 on Tarim Mummies (at Xiaohe site).



While arguing for the one theory the Chinese authors were instructed in by Victor Mair - the theory of the tentatively "steppe IE" Europeans of Afanasevo as being the source of the early stratum at Tarim, with BMAC as source for the later strata (since Victor Mair was forced to concede that much in earlier papers) - the all-Chinese authors of this latest paper, free of Mair's eurocentrist influence, find sufficient evidence to argue for the 2nd theory/model too: of South/West Asians - credited to "BMAC" of Afghanistan - having been the source of Tarim Basin culture throughout (directly in the 1st phase and via BMAC input into the steppes/Andronovo during the 2nd phase) -



bmcgenet.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s12863-015-0237-5

Analysis of ancient human mitochondrial DNA from the Xiaohe cemetery: insights into prehistoric population movements in the Tarim Basin, China

C.Li et al 2015

The second model, known as the “Bactrian oasis hypothesis”, also postulates a two-step settlement of the Tarim Basin in the Bronze Age, but maintains that the first settlers were farmers of the Bactria–Margiana Archaeological Complex (or BMAC, also known as the Oxus civilization) (ca. 2200–1500 B.C.) west of Xinjiang in Uzbekistan (north Bactria), Afghanistan (south Bactria), and Turkmenistan [17], followed later by the Andronovo people from the northwest (Fig. 1) [5, 7]. This model emphasises the environmental similarities between the Xinjiang and Central Asian desert basins, and suggests that certain features, including the irrigation systems, wheat remains, woolen textiles, bones of sheep and goats, and traces of the medicinal plant Ephedra found in Xinjiang could be evidence of links with the Oxus civilization [5, 7, 16]

As for irrigation systems, that's what SSVC was excellent at. But of course SSVC is not credited except indirectly via BMAC.

And wheat was already one of the things the early layer at Mehrgarh (7000 BCE) was famous for. In contrast, steppes didn't have cereals/farming/agriculture until late. See Mallory on steppes versus cereals. And this is borne out by steppe aDNA: not until the R1a-heavy contingents bearing the "farmer" (so-called "Anatolian Neolithic") component appear on the steppes - seen in Potapovka to Sintashta-Andronovo and Srubna. And this component did not enter the steppes from Corded Ware in C-Europe - an option which was ruled out by Mathieson et al 2015, who suggested a "more eastern source" instead. Moroever, NO lactase persistence attested among Yamna - Mathieson discounts Allentoft's earlier inference of its presence among Yamna. Mathieson only detected LP allele in Srubna.



And Mallory also found no close connection between Afanasevo and Tarim. Only Mair imagines there to be one.





Excerpts still from C.Li et al 2015 (on Xiaohe, an early site of the Tarim Basin):

The cemetery was excavated between 2002 and 2005, and consisted of five strata with radiocarbon dates ranging from 4000 to 3500 years before present (14C yBP) [19, 22].



...



In contrast, people bearing the south /west Asian components could have reached the Tarim Basin through the Pamirs, moving eastward along the south or north edges of the Tarim Basin. Recently one study showed that agricultural populations had contact with nearby mobile pastoralists at the beginning of the second millennium BC in Central Asia [58], indicating that genetic components of agriculturalists might also introgress into pastoralist populations. This was confirmed by the evidence that one Indian haplogroup was found in ancient Kazakhstan [37]. Therefore, people bearing the south/west Asian components could have first married into pastoralist populations, and reached North Xinjiang through the Kazakh steppe following the movement of pastoralist populations, then spread from north Xinjiang southward into the Tarim Basin across the Tianshan Mountains, and intermarried with the earlier inhabitants of the region, giving rise to the later, admixed Xiaohe community. Given that the south/west Asian components are relatively minor in the Xiaohe population, it is likely that nomadic herders from northern steppe had a greater impact on the eastern Tarim Basin than the Central Asian oasis farmers.

(Which sounds pretty much like they're arguing for early Indic influence on steppes - since "at the beginning of the second millennium BC in Central Asia" and travelling up the steppes. And note the authors are even arguing for genetic Indic influence: "marrying into pastoralist populations" and then "through the Kazakh steppe" spreading into Tarim.

The Chinese authors have only learnt about the steppist theory on Tarim and not learnt the steppist PIE theory let alone the steppe IA invasion theory, where Indians are only allowed to be invaded by steppes. No wonder I've not seen a single steppist quote the above paper. Also they say things like



The archaeological evidence for woolen textiles and the medicinal plant Ephedra* in the earliest Xiaohe layer and the Gumugou site indicate that the oasis culture (=BMAC, Bactria-Margiana Archaeological Complex in Afghanistan) had reached the Tarim Basin in the early Bronze Age. It is well known that Ephedra was used by oasis farmers, whereas it does not grow in the Russo-Kazakh steppe, nor is associated with the Afanasievo or Andronovo cultures [5, 7]. Furthermore, the wheat excavated from Xiaohe was hexaploid bread wheat, a cereal grain cultivated originally in the Near East [59]. Therefore, it is possible that the oasis route may have been significant in the peopling of Xinjiang in the early Bronze Age, at least northern or western Xinjiang. This was supported by the evidence that Indian haplogroup M25 was observed in one ancient individual from later Neolithic Ganqing region (data unpublished). The groups reaching the Tarim Basin through the oasis route may have interacted culturally with earlier populations from the steppe, with limited gene flow, resulting in a small genetic signal of the oasis agriculturalists in the Xiaohe community.

* some theorise that ephedra = soma



Of course the Chinese authors subconsciously reduce Indian-specific contribution in Tarim to an Afghan proxy (BMAC) alone, all because their instructor is the white supremacist Mair who has brainwashed them.

Meanwhile Hemphill's craniometric studies had overridden Mallory & Mair, by concluding that Tarim Basin mummies instead consisted of SSVC followed by BMAC.

The Indian-specific mtDNA found in Tarim - and since well before, in that overall region of China (since the late neolithic) - shows that long before BMAC even existed, Indians were travelling into that area.



So it should be seen as a continuity when Indian-specific mtDNA was found in layers 1-4 in Tarim (M5) at Xiaohe. Also at the same layers, mtDNA U7 was found at Tarim. U7 is Indian to Iranian in origin but distinct among them since 20,000 ybp, as per Metspalu 2004. U7 does occur in lower frequencies in Armenians in Caucasus. It also occurs quite rarely among Europeans: very low frequency among southern Europeans, Fins, Siberians, but not found among E Europeans/Balts as per Kivisild. Metspalu therefore describes U7 as virtually absent in Europe. It's not attested in steppe aDNA of Mathieson data set either.



Plus, none of the "European" mtDNA found at Xiaohe were European-specific, they're just *called* "west-Eurasian" which is often code for "Near East/West Asia" both of which include middle-east and Iran. Meanwhile, as per Mark Wade's mtDNA site, U2e - no longer considered Eurospecific - and W are of Indian origin (and India seems to have the basal U2e clade too, yet Li et al 2015 refer to old studies to conclude "While Xiaohe U2e haplotype has not been observed in living populations, the hg U2e is thought to have originated in Europe, from where it had been spread into central Siberia in the Bronze Age [39]." So modern Europe doesn't have U2e and I can't see - from the ancient DNA dataset collected so far - that it ever did. No wonder Mark Wade's mtDNA has simply adjusted U2e's origins to India.



And other than the M5, U7, U2e and W mentioned, all other so-called "West-Eurasian" hgs attested in Tarim have origins estimated to be in the Middle-east/Near East/"west-Asia". (And as per Reich, Samara before 6000 years ago didn't have mtDNA Hgs other than U4 and U5 - of upper palaeolithic age. So apparently, all other mtDNA were migrant to Samara on the steppes after that.)



And notably all these other "west-Eurasian" mtDNA found at Xiaohe - since the oldest layer - are present in Indians** else explained by Iranians. (Iranians even have some E Y-subclades, though Greek-like E in Iran could be from late Greek input?) Only if the authors documented exact subclades can the real issue be resolved of whether anything is Euro-specific or rather Indian/Iranian.

Until then, the simplest solution is to have Tarim be Asian (Siberian and E Asian and Indic and perhaps also Iranian). Which fits well with Hemphill's conclusions.





** Even the most basal "west-Eurasian" mtDNA at Tarim are present in India (U5a, and U2e which last, as mentioned, has recently been said to have its origins in India not Europe after all - and is common among southern Vanavasis and other Hindu communities). mtDNA T hasn't been attested in India as far as I'm aware. But in India, T1 and T2 with lots of structure under them are attested. So T itself may perhaps be present too, though rarer. And IIRC, I couldn't find T mtDNA in the 230 aDNA genomes of Mathieson's data set, only subclades.

Moreover, the M5 and U7 and the wheat farming (see Mallory on no farming in early steppes) and ephedra clinches the issue. The population that shows ALL the non-Siberian/non-E Asian mtDNA haplogroups attested in Xiaohe are Indian (and throw in Iranian too) populations. Europe can't explain them all by itself. But Indians together with Iranians can explain them all by itself.

The authors ought to have presented the specific subclades of each mtDNA Hg they found, which they didn't do. But that could have proven "European-specific" markers.



A previous study featuring Mair claimed all male Tarim mummies were R1a1a for Y-DNA. A Chinese co-author later explained none of these were R1aZ93 and that this meant they were not Indian. However, no one has actually proven that Indians have no other R1a1a than Z93.

Meanwhile, we have the R1a1 paragroup (R1a1*):



en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haplogroup_R1a

R-SRY1532.2 (R1a1)



R1a1 is defined by SRY1532.2 or SRY10831.2), understood to always include SRY10831.2, M448, L122, M459, and M516.[11][14] This family of lineages is dominated by M17 and M198. In contrast, paragroup R-SRY1532.2* lacks either the M17 or M198 markers.



The R-SRY1532.2* paragroup is apparently less rare than R1*, but still relatively unusual, though it has been tested in more than one survey. Underhill[13] reported 1/51 in Norway, 3/305 in Sweden, 1/57 Greek Macedonians, 1/150 Iranians, 2/734 ethnic Armenians, and 1/141 Kabardians. While Sahoo[15] reported R-SRY1532.2* for 1/15 Himachal Pradesh Rajput samples.

R1aZ93 may merely have had a very successful diversification in India (imagine clans, a few bearing R1aZ93), while others were not so successful and some of these may have been ejected from the NW gateway via Afghanistan into Tarim etc.





Moral: Indian-specific mtDNA attested in aDNA all over "Eurasia" and Near East (Mesopotamia and ancient Syria) since before Bronze Age or at least since Bronze age. Indians are not the ones that need to prove ancient expansions.