[INDOLOGY] Another interesting study on Indian genetics - from The Hindu and the actual paper

Sun Sep 8 07:48:07 UTC 2019

In the Shinde, et. al., paper published in Cell, the authors seem to use a terminology that is not very clear. In the following sentence, what they are referring to by ‘southeast’ is really with respect to Rakhigarhi meaning locations in South Asia southeast of Rakhigarhi. 

“The estimated proportion of ancestry related to tribal groups in southern India in I6113 is smaller than in present-day groups, suggesting that since the time of the IVC there has been gene flow into the part of South Asia where Rakhigarhi lies from both the northwest (bringing more Steppe ancestry) and southeast (bringing more ancestry related to tribal groups in southern India).”

The people mentioned by “ancestry related to tribal groups in southern India” South Asian Hunter Gatherers as can be seen in Fig. 3 of Narasimhan, et. al., published in Science. 

But Figure 3 of article by Shinde, et. al., calls the same people Southeast Asian Hunter Gatherers. This confusion of ‘South Asians’ versus ‘Southeast Asians’ has led to a popular magazine article (https://www.theatlantic.com/science/archive/2019/09/indus-valley-civilization-dna-has-long-eluded-researchers/597481/) to state:

“What’s intriguing about I6113’s DNA is what she lacks: any of the steppe ancestry that is widespread in contemporary South Asians. Instead, she appeared to have a mix of Southeast Asian hunter-gatherer and Iranian-related ancestry.”

Given so many common contributors for the two articles, how could this have come about?  Or am I missing something?

Thanks

Regards

Palaniappan

From: INDOLOGY <indology-bounces at list.indology.info> on behalf of Indology List <indology at list.indology.info>
Reply-To: Dean Michael Anderson <eastwestcultural at yahoo.com>
Date: Saturday, September 7, 2019 at 4:56 PM
To: Indology List <indology at list.indology.info>, Steve Farmer <saf at safarmer.com>
Subject: Re: [INDOLOGY] Another interesting study on Indian genetics - from The Hindu and the actual paper

I don't feel so bad about conflating the two articles now that I see they were both covered in the same article in Science Daily. How often does it happen that two important genetic studies covering South Asia appear at the same time? Interestingly, they also have many of the same authors: David Reich, Vagheesh M. Narasimhan, Nick Patterson, etc.

Here is the link to the Science Daily article which summarizes both articles:

https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2019/09/190905145348.htm?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+sciencedaily%2Ftop_news%2Ftop_science+%28ScienceDaily%3A+Top+Science+News%29&utm_content=Yahoo%21+Mail

and the direct link to the Rakhigarhi article published in Cell magazine which I was able to download in full:

https://www.cell.com/cell/fulltext/S0092-8674(19)30967-5?_returnURL=https%3A%2F%2Flinkinghub.elsevier.com%2Fretrieve%2Fpii%2FS0092867419309675%3Fshowall%3Dtrue

Best,

Dean

On Saturday, September 7, 2019, 11:39:12 PM GMT+5:30, Dean Michael Anderson via INDOLOGY <indology at list.indology.info> wrote: 

Thanks for the correction, Steve. It was indeed, as you observe, posted in too much haste.

Best,

Dean

On Saturday, September 7, 2019, 11:24:11 PM GMT+5:30, Steve Farmer via INDOLOGY <indology at list.indology.info> wrote: 

Dean -

The Hindu story you just posted in Indology (below), based on Shinde’s very well-known claims, is certainly NOT based on Narasimhan et al. — the paper I posted early on Indo-Eurasian Research, then on Indology, and that you just reposted below.

Very different papers, published in different journals, and of totally unequal importance.

Narasimhan et al. is based on finds involving 523 aDNA samples from Central Asia, S. Asia, and Iran. It is the largest study by far ever published on aDNA evidence re. Central Asia and South Asia.

Shinde’s paper, cited by all the Hindutva types, is based on a single reconstructed aDNA sample of one (1) female skeleton discovered years ago by Shinde at Rakhigarh. 

If you have to read a news story about it rather than consulting the full paper (Shinde’s was published in Cell, not Science), read this story about it in Science, which doesn’t have a nationalist axe to grind:

https://www.sciencemag.org/news/2019/09/genome-nearly-5000-year-old-woman-links-modern-indians-ancient-civilization

The skeleton showed genetic affinities, as you’ll see in the story, to aDNA samples from Iran and Turkmenistan, which supports lots of evidence of other sorts that the Indus Valley civilization was populated by peoples from outside India: not so nativist after all.

Shinde’s paper carries a very misleading title: "An Ancient Harappan Genome Lacks Ancestry from Steppe Pastoralists or Iranian farmers” . True but devious and misleading: it does carry genes from outside India, so not so nativist after all.

Maybe check your sources before posting?

Steve

On Sep 7, 2019, at 1:12 PM, Dean Michael Anderson via INDOLOGY <indology at list.indology.info> wrote:

‘Indus Valley settlers had a distinct genetic lineage’ 
Throwing fresh light on the Indus Valley Civilisation, a study of DNA from skeletal remains excavated from the Harappan cemetery at Rakhigarhi argues that the hunter-gatherers of South Asia, who then became a settled people, have an independent origin. The researchers who conducted the study contend that the theory of the Harappans having Steppe pastoral or ancient Iranian farmer ancestry thus stands refuted. The finding also negates the hypothesis about mass migration during Harappan times from outside South Asia, they argue.

https://www.thehindu.com/sci-tech/science/indus-valley-settlers-had-a-distinct-genetic-lineage/article29355941.ece

Here is the actual paper since the journal is behind a paywall.

https://reich.hms.harvard.edu/sites/reich.hms.harvard.edu/files/inline-files/2019_Science_NarasimhanPatterson_CentralSouthAsia.pdf

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