Bracero-Quiñones, Luciann

Profile Picture

Filters

20121
Reset filters

Settings

Citations

Publication Search Results

Now showing 1 - 1 of 1
  • Thumbnail Image
    Publication
    Genetic Variation in the African Mitochondrial Haplogroup L3e in Puerto Rico
    (2012) Bracero-Quiñones, Luciann; Martínez-Cruzado, Juan C.; College of Arts and Sciences - Sciences; Bird Picó, Fernando J.; Oleksyk, Taras; Department of Biology; Matos-Pagán, Abigail
    This study aims to clarify the uncertainties of the African maternal origin of the Puerto Rico modern population that occurred during the slave trade. Haplogroup L3e was chosen for this study because it combines the properties of being one of the most frequent Sub-Saharan haplogroup (17%) within our Puerto Rican present population at the same time that it presents distinct sub-haplogroups with uneven distributions in the African continent. The mitochondrial DNA haplogroup L3e is characterized by the gain of the restriction site 2349 MboI or DpnII within the Afro-Eurasian paragroup L3 (-3592 HpaI). Restriction site polymorphisms and Hyper Variable Sequence-I (HVS-I) screening in haplogroup L3e define five principal sub-haplogroups (L3e1, L3e2, L3e3, L3e4 and L3e5). Thirty-five L3e samples were classified into L3e sub-haplogroups. Because Puerto Rico African heredity suggests a mainly West African origin, we expected that the most frequent sub-haplogroup would be L3e2, which is the most frequent in Western Africa. However, the most frequent L3e mitochondrial DNAs in Puerto Rico belongs to a Restriction Fragment Length Polymorphism (RFLP) type shared by L3e1 and L3e2b. Sequencing showed a higher frequency of L3e1 among our present population, leaving L3e2 as second most frequent and L3e4 and L3e3 as the least frequent sub-haplogroups. Principal Component Analysis and an equation based on a Bayesian approach of the sub- haplogroup frequency distribution suggest that the L3e origin is more similar to Mozambique than to any other African region. The study of the sub-haplogroups is important because these have not been characterized for Puerto Rico and the information provided by them may shed light on the geographic origins of African slaves sent to Puerto Rico from the 16th to 19th century.