Genetic Ancestry of Rapanui before and after European Contact
Open accessAbstract
The origins and lifeways of the inhabitants of Rapa Nui (Easter Island), a remote island in the southeast Pacific Ocean, have been debated for generations. Archaeological evidence substantiates the widely accepted view that the island was first settled by people of Polynesian origin, as late as 1200 CE [1-4]. What remains controversial, however, is the nature of events in the island's population history prior to the first historic contact with Europeans in 1722 CE. Purported contact between Rapa Nui and South America is particularly contentious, and recent studies have reported genetic evidence for Native American admixture in present-day indigenous inhabitants of Rapa Nui [5-8]. Statistical modeling has suggested that this genetic contribution might have occurred prior to European contact [6]. Here we directly test the hypothesis that the Native American admixture of the current Rapa Nui population predates the arrival of Europeans with a paleogenomic analysis of five individual samples excavated from Ahu Nau Nau, Anakena, dating to pre- and post-European contact, respectively. Complete mitochondrial genomes and low-coverage autosomal genomes show that the analyzed individuals fall within the genetic diversity of present-day and ancient Polynesians, and we can reject the hypothesis that any of these individuals had substantial Native American ancestry. Our data thus suggest that the Native American ancestry in contemporary Easter Islanders was not present on the island prior to European contact and may thus be due to events in more recent history.
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The only other ancient whole-genome Rapanui study carried out so far did not find evidence for Rapanui-Native American contact.
“the only other ancient whole-genome Rapanui study carried out so far did not find evidence for Rapanui–Native American contact.”
From Ancient Rapanui genomes reveal resilience and pre-European contact with the Americas (2024) · cites this paper as [6]
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Ancient Rapanui genomes reveal resilience and pre-European contact with the Americas
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- Authors
- Fehren-Schmitz, L., Jarman, C. L., Harkins, K. M., Kayser, M., Popp, B. N., & Skoglund, P.
- Affiliations
- University of Bristol (GB)
- University of California, Santa Cruz (US)
- Erasmus MC (NL)
- University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa (US)
- Harvard University (US)
- Venue
- Current Biology
- Publisher
- Elsevier BV
- Published
- 2017-10
- Volume
- 27
- Issue
- 20
- Pages
- 3209-3215.e6
- ISSN
- 0960-9822 (ISSN-L)
- OpenAlex
- W2762790702
- Cited by
- 47
- References
- 56
- Citations by year
- 2026: 1 · 2025: 2 · 2024: 6 · 2023: 2 · 2022: 4 · 2021: 2 · 2020: 8 · 2019: 17 · 2018: 5
- FWCI
- 5.43
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- bronze
- doi.org
- Licence
- www.elsevier.com/tdm/userlicense/1.0/ (tdm)
- www.elsevier.com/legal/tdmrep-license (tdm)
- www.elsevier.com/open-access/userlicense/1.0/ (vor, 387 d)
- doi.org/10.15223/policy-017 (stm-asf)
- doi.org/10.15223/policy-037 (stm-asf)
- doi.org/10.15223/policy-012 (stm-asf)
- doi.org/10.15223/policy-029 (stm-asf)
- doi.org/10.15223/policy-004 (stm-asf)
- Locations
- Current Biology (publishedVersion)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- EUR Research Repository (Erasmus University Rotterdam) (submittedVersion)
- eScholarship (California Digital Library) (submittedVersion)
- Funders
- University of California Presidential Research Catalyst Award (CA-17-445724)
- Swedish Research Council (VR2014-453)
- National Science Foundation (NSF 1513501)
- Topics
- Life Sciences › Biochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology › Genetics › Forensic and Genetic Research
- Social Sciences › Geography, Planning and Development › Pacific and Southeast Asian Studies
- Life Sciences › Biochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology › Genetics › Genetic diversity and population structure
- Keywords
- Easter Island, genetic ancestry, pre-European contact, paleogenomics, mitochondrial genome, autosomal genome, Polynesian origins
- MeSH terms
- Archaeology, Female, Humans, Indians, South American, Male, Polynesia, Genetic Variation, Genome, Human, Genome, Mitochondrial, Human Migration
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