... Onthebasis of microsatelliteanalysisitmaybeconcludedthatthepresentgeneticstructure of mongoloids of Sikkimisnotakintothemongoloids of NortheastIndia in spite of their similarethnicity, and similarhabitate.Duetolongtimeisolation and amalgamationwithnon-mongoloids of adjacentareathesecommunitiesexhibit a mixedgenepool.Thetime of divergencerevealtheroute of thepossiblemigration of Lepcha of Sikkim in IndiawasfromEastAsiathroughTibet.Thiscouldbethereason of their highgeneticaffinitywithNepali,Bhutia, and thosepopulations(e.g.Chinese)whohadalsomigratedviathesameroutei.e.Zang(Tibet)-maincorridor,themostfrequentroutetoentertheHimalayasfromtheeast(Fig.2).Theextent of geneticvariation in threepredominantmongoloidpopulations of Sikkim and mongoloids of northeastIndiacouldbeattributedtosignificant role playedbymigratoryevents in geneticdifferentiation.Although a largernumber of lociareessentialfordrawingAbstractBackground: A widespectrum of geneticdiversity in mongoloids of Indiaiswelldocumented.Thoughallmongoloids of IndiaareknowntohaveoriginatedfromtheMongolregion of Chinabuttheperiod and route of migrationfrom their nativelandtodifferentHimalayanregionsislittleknown.Thusthestudiesongenomicdiversity of people of Sikkim, a centralHimalayanstate of Indiawithdifferentmigrantmongoloidgroups,assumegreatsignificance in understandingtheimpact of migratoryevents in thegeneticdifferentiation of populations.Wethereforestudiedthegeneticdiversityonthebasis of 13-tetranucleotide and 2pentanucleotidemicrosatellitelocifor a total of 208allelefrequencies in threemajorpopulations of Sikkim,withdifferentethnohistory and time of settlement.Result:Thestudyonmicrosatelliteallelefrequencydatasuggeststhatallthethreepopulations of Sikkimaregeneticallymoreakintothemongoloids of China and distinctlyapartfromthemongoloids of NortheastIndia.HoweverSikkimpopulationsarealsogeneticallyclosetonon-mongoloids of surroundingareas.Theaverageheterozygosity and coefficient of genedifferentiationamongSikkimpopulationsaremoderate.Number of sharedalleles and their frequencies,time of divergence and bottleneckeffectreveal a distinctiveness of themongoloidssettled in SikkimfromthemainIndianmongoloidstockasalsodifferentroute of migrationthanthemongoloidpopulation of NortheastIndia.Conclusion:Ourstudyclearlydemonstratesthatthepresentdaymongoloids of Sikkimaregeneticallydistinctfrommongoloids of NortheastIndiadueto their differentroute of migration,time of settlement, and admixturewithothernon-mongoloidpopulations of adjoiningareas.Thissubstantiatesthatmigratoryeventshaveplayed a significant role in thedifferentiation of mongoloids of India.whichbelongtoTibeto-Burmanlinguisticsubfamily and representtheIndo-Mongoloidethnicgroup of NortheastIndia[34].Brahmins of Orissa(n=60)[39],Bihar(n=59)[40] and Karnataka(n=65)[41]havebeentakentobe of theIndo-Caucasianorigin.Chinese and Caucasiandatahavebeenusedforglobalpopulationreference[42].StatisticalAnalysis:-Thefrequencies of eachalleleforindividualSTRlociwerecalculatedfromthenumber of eachgenotype in thesamplesetbythemethod of genecount[43].Wehaveused165alleles of 12microsatellitelociforcomparison,sincedataonD16S539,PentaE, and PentaDlociarenotavailableforNortheastIndianpopulations.Thenumber of sharedalleles and their variance(V)werescoredforthe12loci in MICROSATtochecktheallelicdiversityamongthepopulations.Pair-wisegeneticdistancesamongpopulationswerecomputedusingvariousdistancemeasuresD A [44],Ds[14],Dc[45],Dsw[46],(δµ)2[17] and Fst[47]with1000replicationsusingsimulationprogramMICROSAT[48].Thesegeneticdistancemeasuresareseentobe a highlyefficientparameterforcomputingcorrectphylogenytrees and evolutionarytimespanunderdifferentevolutionaryconditions.Besidestheyareleastaffectedbysmallsamplesize[27].Phylogenyanalysiswascarriedoutfollowingtheneighbourjoining(NJ)[49] and theunweightedpairgroupmethodwitharithmeticmean(UPGMA)[50]methods.TheGst(genediversity) and heterozygosityvalueswerecomputedusingtheprogrammeDISPAN[51] and programme[52]wasusedforgeneratingphylogenetictrees.Time of separationfromcommonancestorhasbeencalculatedbyusingthegeneticdistancesDs,Dsw and (δµ)2betweenpopulations.SIGNtestfor15microsatelliteloci of Sikkimpopulationswasperformedtocheckwhetherpopulationsexperiencedanybottleneck in recentpastornot[26]underIAM(Infiniteallelemodel)aswellasSMM34.SinghKS:India'sCommunities,NationalSeries.People of India.OxfordUniversityPress,1998.35.Kashyap ... Theaboveadvantageshavemademicrosatellitemarkersextremelyinformative in understandingthegeneticstructure,migratoryhistory and evolution of humanpopulations[21-23] and ourmarker of choicetoexaminetheimpact of migratoryeventsonthegeneticdifferentiation of Sikkimsettlers and their geneticrelationshipwithothermongoloids of NortheastIndia, and Caucasoid-affiliatedpopulations of adjoiningarea.ResultsGeneticdifferentiation&heterozygosity:-Locus and populationwiseheterozygosity and Gst(coefficient of genedifferentiation)valuesreflectingtheextent of differentiationamongthepopulations of Sikkimareshown in Table1.TheaverageGstvalue(0.0237)suggestsmoderatedegree of genedifferentiationamongthestudiedpopulations.Thevalueshowevervastlydifferfromlocitoloci;itisonly0.004atlociD3S1358, and D16S539,while0.088atlociFGA.Similarlymoderatedifferentiation(0.0206to0.0365)wasobservedatlociPentaD,CSF1PO,TPOX,D8S1179,VWA,D5S818 and D7S820.Averageheterozygosityobservedatdifferentlocidepictsthemongoloidethnicgroup,albeittheLepchaaresaidtobetheforerunneramongthesettlers in thestate,followedbyBhutia and Nepalimigration in thestate[1].TheBhutiacommunityisbasicallythepeople of Tibetan(Chinese)origin, and their migrationtoSikkimhadoccurredatleast800yearsago.TheNepalesearrived in Sikkimabout200yearsago[1].Thoughthemigration of LepchatoSikkimis a contentiousissue,therearetwomajortheoriesabouttheLepchaorigin and period of migrationtoSikkim:(i) A smallpopulation of NagastockfromtheGarohills of AssammigratedtoSikkimabout2000yearsago, and (ii) a groupfromeastAsiamainlandmigratedthroughTibet(China)duringanearlierphase of humanmigrationtotheHimalayasatleast3000yearsago[1].Thecomplexmigration and settlementhistory of differentgroups in Sikkimwithrespectto their genetichistoryisstilllittleknown.Autosomal and Y chromosomeSTRmarkers[2-4],aswellasMitochondrialDNA[5]studiesillustratemigration and geneticdiversity of mongoloids in East and South-EastAsia.Thesestudies,however,donotprovideanyinformationaboutmongoloidmigration and settlement in differentregions of India.Although,severalstudieshavebeencarriedoutongeneticdiversity,phylogeneticrelationship, and thepattern of geneflowamongIndianmongoloidpopulationsbasedonclassicalgeneticmarkers,e.g.Tf,Ge,PGM1loci[6,7],serumproteins and redcellenzymes[8], and a combinedstudybyRoychoudhury and Nei.[9],theyfailtoprovideanyinsightintothehistory of migration and settlement of Mongoloids in India.Similarlythestudywith17polymorphicsystem of thebloodbyBhasinetal.1986providesinformationaboutthegeneticstructure of people of Sikkimtosomeextent. In thisstudyweusedmicrosatelliteDNAmarkerstoaddresstheconsequence of migratoryeventsongeneticstructure of Sikkimpopulationsas,theyaremoreabundant in the44.Nei ... SahaN,BhattacaryyaSP,MukhopadhyayB,BhattacharyyaSK,GuptaR,Basu A: A geneticstudyamongtheLepchas of theDarjeelingarea of easternIndia,HumanHeredity198 7a, 37:113-121.7. SahaN,MukhopadhyayB,BhattacharyyaSK,GuptaR,Basu A: Thedistribution of transferring, group-specific...