1: Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 2003 Jan 7;100(1):177-82. Epub 2002 Dec 30.
Color and genomic ancestry in Brazilians.
Parra FC, Amado RC, Lambertucci JR, Rocha J, Antunes CM, Pena SD.
Departamento de Bioquimica e Imunologia, Universidade Federal de Minas Gerais, 31270-901 Belo Horizonte, Brazil.
This work was undertaken to ascertain to what degree the physical appearance of a Brazilian individual was predictive of genomic African ancestry.
Using a panel of 10 population-specific alleles, we assigned to each person an African ancestry index (AAI). The procedure was able to tell apart, with no overlaps, 20 males from northern Portugal from 20 males from São Tomé Island on the west coast of Africa....
... In contrast to the clear-cut results with the African and European samples, our results showed large variances and extensive overlaps among the three Color categories. We next embarked on a study of 200 unrelated Brazilian white males who originated from cosmopolitan centers of the four major geographic regions of the country. The results showed AAI values intermediate between Europeans and Africans, even in southern Brazil, a region predominantly peopled by European immigrants.
Our data suggest that in Brazil, at an individual level, color, as determined by physical evaluation, is a poor predictor of genomic African ancestry, estimated by molecular markers.
PMID: 12509516 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]