Molecular and Demographic Population Genetic Studies of Southwestern Indian Tribes

该项目的主要目标是通过对阿尔伯克基印第安人医院采集的血液样本进行分析，澄清一些美国西南部印第安人部落的进化关系。这些部落的血缘关系多年来一直是争论的来源。随着DNA分型技术的发展，现在可以比以前更精确地估计群体的遗传亲缘关系。由于语言学家还为部落制定了语言差异的衡量标准，因此有可能根据遗传和语言标准来衡量亲属关系树之间的相似性。将对15个群体进行抽样，并在100多个多态基因座上进行分型。将使用既考虑到共同祖先的后裔的相似性，又考虑到由于迁徙和混合而产生的相似性的数学模型。

The primary objective of this project is to clarify the evolutionary relationships of a number of Southwestern American Indian tribes through the analysis of blood samples gathered through the Albuquerque Indian Hospital. The genetic relationships of these tribes have been a source of debate for many years. With the development of DNA typing techniques, it is now possible to estimate the genetic relatedness of the populations with much greater precision than previously. As linguists have also developed measures of linguistic divergence for the tribes, it will be possible to measure the similarities between the trees of relatedness as judged by genetic and linguistic criteria. Fifteen populations will be sampled and typings done on over 100 polymorphic loci. Mathematical models which take into account both similarities due to descent from a common ancestor and those due to migration and admixture will be employed.