Home > Technical section > Biology > Molecular biology > Population genetics > By geographic areas > Europe > Saami
Saami
Wednesday 28 September 2005
The Finnish Saami (Lapps) are, as Finns, a Finno-Ugric-speaking population.
The Saami showed exceptionally low variation in their mtDNA restriction sites. (8651309)
The 9-bp deletion common in East Asian populations was not observed. (8651309)
The average number of nucleotide substitutions from the mtDNA haplotype data indicated that the Finnish Saami may be closer to the Finns than to the other reference populations. (8651309)
Nuclear DNA suggested that the Finns are more closely related to the European reference populations than to the Finnish Saami. The similarity of the Finns to the other Europeans was even more pronounced according to the sequence data. (8651309)
The Finnish Saami are distinct from other Circumarctic populations, although two of the lineages found among the Saami showed closer relationship to the Circumarctic than to the European lineages. (8651309)
The sequence data indicated an exceptionally high divergence for the Saami mtDNA control lineages. The distribution of the pairwise nucleotide differences in the Saami suggested that this population has not experienced an expansion similar to what was indicated for the Finns. (8651309)
The Saami of Scandinavia and the Berbers of North Africa were found to share an extremely young branch, aged merely approximately 9,000 years. This unexpected finding not only confirms that the Franco-Cantabrian refuge area of southwestern Europe was the source of late-glacial expansions of hunter-gatherers that repopulated northern Europe after the Last Glacial Maximum but also reveals a direct maternal link between those European hunter-gatherer populations and the Berbers. (15791543)
The sequencing of entire human mitochondrial DNAs belonging to Haplogroup U reveals that this clade arose shortly after the "out of Africa" exit and rapidly radiated into numerous regionally distinct subclades. (15791543)
References
Achilli A, Rengo C, Battaglia V, Pala M, Olivieri A, Fornarino S, Magri C, Scozzari R, Babudri N, Santachiara-Benerecetti AS, Bandelt HJ, Semino O, Torroni A. Saami and Berbers—an unexpected mitochondrial DNA link. Am J Hum Genet. 2005 May;76(5):883-6. PMID: 15791543
Tambets K, Rootsi S, Kivisild T, Help H, Serk P, Loogvali EL, Tolk HV, Reidla M, Metspalu E, Pliss L, Balanovsky O, Pshenichnov A, Balanovska E, Gubina M, Zhadanov S, Osipova L, Damba L, Voevoda M, Kutuev I, Bermisheva M, Khusnutdinova E, Gusar V, Grechanina E, Parik J, Pennarun E, Richard C, Chaventre A, Moisan JP, Barac L, Pericic M, Rudan P, Terzic R, Mikerezi I, Krumina A, Baumanis V, Koziel S, Rickards O, De Stefano GF, Anagnou N, Pappa KI, Michalodimitrakis E, Ferak V, Furedi S, Komel R, Beckman L, Villems R. The western and eastern roots of the Saami—the story of genetic "outliers" told by mitochondrial DNA and Y chromosomes. Am J Hum Genet. 2004 Apr;74(4):661-82. PMID: 15024688
Lahermo P, Sajantila A, Sistonen P, Lukka M, Aula P, Peltonen L, Savontaus ML. The genetic relationship between the Finns and the Finnish Saami (Lapps): analysis of nuclear DNA and mtDNA. Am J Hum Genet. 1996 Jun;58(6):1309-22. PMID: 8651309
