Research on the Yayoi people and their society based on the mitochondria DNA analysis

利用形态学和古人口学特征对九州北部绳纹时代向弥生时代过渡的人类学研究进行了研究。日本的北九州是靠近韩半岛的地区，过去受到外国文化和亚洲大陆移民的影响很大。该地区弥生人的特征被认为是来自朝鲜半岛或中国移民的遗传涌入。然而，关于绳纹人向弥生人过渡的几个重要问题需要进一步审查，特别是在假定的移民进入该地区的早期阶段。在九州北部解决这些关于这两个时期过渡的问题的主要困难是缺乏属于这两个时期之间的合适的骨骼材料。因此，谁是日本的第一批稻农是不清楚的。换句话说，包括新文化和全面水稻农业在内的“弥生革命”是由绳纹原住民还是新移民发起的？由于缺乏这些时期的骨骼遗骸，因此很难直接讨论这个问题，我们试图通过古人口统计学和形态学分析来重建九州北部的这一过渡时期。从种群遗传学分析的结果来看，有理由认为早期有少数人最初从亚洲大陆迁移过来，这与考古资料是一致的。此后，移民人口的规模大幅增加，他们，而不是土生土长的绳纹人，在弥生文化的发展中起了主要作用。

Anthropological study of the transition form the Jomon to the Yayoi Periods in northern Kyushu was performed using morphological and paleodemographical features. Northern Kyushu, the area of Japan located closet to the Korean Peninsula, has been considerably influenced by foreign culture and immigrants for the Asian mainland in the past. The feature of Yayoi people in this region has been attributed to a genetic influx of immigrants from the Korean Peninsula or China . However, several important questions require further scrutiny concerning with the transition from Jomon to Yayoi peoples, especially in the early stages of the supposed immigration into this region. The main difficulty in solving these questions concerning with the transition during these periods in the northern Kyushu has been the lack of suitable skeletal materials belonging to the time between the two periods. Therefore, it is unclear who the first rice agriculturalists in Japan were. In other words, which group of people is responsible for the "Yayoi revolution", including new culture and full scale rice agriculture, the native Jomon people or a new immigrant group? Because it is difficult to discuss this problem directly due to scarcity of skeletal remains from these periods, we attempt a reconstruction of this transitional period in northern Kyushu, by paleodemographic and morphological analyze. Judging from the results by population genetic analysis, it is reasonable to suppose that a small number of people initially migrated form the Asian mainland in early stage, which is consistent with the archaeological data. Following this the size of the immigrant population increased substantially and they, not the native Jomon people, played a principal role in the development of the Yayoi culture from its inception.