A large part of Y-chromosome lineages in East European and East Asian human populations belong to Y-haplogroup NO, which is composed of two sister clades N-M231 and O-M175.
The Y-haplogroup O (O-clade) is relatively old (around 30 thousand years (ky)) and encompasses the vast majority of east and Southeast Asian male lineages, as well as significant proportion of those in Oceanian males.
On the other hand, detailed analyses of Y-haplogroup N suggest that its high frequency in east Europe is due to its more recent expansion westward on a counter-clock northern route from inner Asia/southern Siberia, approximately 12-14 ky ago.
The widespread presence of Y-haplogroup N in Siberia, together with its absence in Native Americans, implies its spread happened after the founder event for the Americas.
The most frequent Y-subhaplogroup N3, arose probably in the region of present day China, and subsequently experienced serial bottlenecks in Siberia and secondary expansions in eastern Europe.
Another branch, Y-subhaplogroup N2, forms two distinctive subclusters of STR haplotypes, Asian (N2-A) and European (N2-E), the latter now mostly distributed in Finno-Ugric and related populations.
These phylogeographic patterns provide evidence consistent with male-mediated counter-clockwise late Pleistocene-Holocene migratory trajectories toward Northwestern Europe from an ancestral East Asian source of Paleolithic heritage.
References
Rootsi S, Zhivotovsky LA, Baldovic M, Kayser M, Kutuev IA, Khusainova R, Bermisheva MA, Gubina M, Fedorova SA, Ilumae AM, Khusnutdinova EK, Voevoda MI, Osipova LP, Stoneking M, Lin AA, Ferak V, Parik J, Kivisild T, Underhill PA, Villems R. A counter-clockwise northern route of the Y-chromosome haplogroup N from Southeast Asia towards Europe. Eur J Hum Genet. 2007 Feb;15(2):204-11. PMID: 17149388