A help required regarding Haplogroup C

[deepak_atreya]

I was STR tested for 12 marker by national geographic project and my haplogroup was confirmed to be C* (m216+ ). I read somewhere that 80% of haplogroup in south india upper caste( to which i belong) which was assigned C* was actually new found haplogroup C5(m356) . Does NG project at 12 markers test for m356? if not how can i confirm? any input or link regarding HG C (esp in south India) would be much appreciated. Thank you in advance.

[cacio]

Deepak:

as far as I know, no company tests for C5. Ethnoancestry tests for C,C1,C2 and C3. Therefore, this does not distinguish C* and C5, but will allow you to exclude C1-C3:

http://www.ethnoancestry.com/haploview.htm

The source of the data on C in India is mainly the Sengupta paper that I cited in a previous post. The data of Sengupta is available here (one of the last entries), which lists both some STR values as well as the source of the data (caste, location, etc):

http://www.dnaheritage.com/rootsweb/

If you download the file, you can check the C observations in the paper and may be try to infer if your STRs are closer to C5 (in Southern India) or C3 (of which there are a few in Pakistan).

cacio

[Kaiser]

deepak_atreya:

Sengupta's much-quoted paper continues to be seminal work, specially for South Asians. Based on this study, there have been no recorded incidences of C1 or C2 in South Asia. The predominant sub-clades of Haplogroup C in South Asia are C* (M-216/RPS4Y), C3 (M-217) and C5 (M-356).

C* is said to be the oldest Out-of-Africa male lineage and exists mostly amongst the Toda and Pallan of South India, besides parts of Indonesia and Malysia; C3 is a Mongol lineage of Genghis Khan's ilk and, besides Central Asia & Mongolia, is found in Pakistani Baluchistan with no reported incidence in India; C5 is the more prevalent clade in South India and, in upper castes, it is found amongst Irula and Iyer as well as the middle class Vanniyar.

Chances are high that you are a C5, based simply on the process of elimination of other sub-clades which do not belong in South Indian upper castes.

The following few quotes from Sengupta's paper are relevant to Haplogroup C and its sub-clades:

"On the basis of the combined phylogeographic distributions of haplotypes observed among populations defined by social and linguistic criteria, candidate HGs that most plausibly arose in situ within the boundaries of present-day India include C5-M356......"

"It is noteworthy that no C3-M217–derived lineages typical of East and Central Asia have been observed in the Indian samples reported thus far (Redd et al. 2002; Kivisild et al. 2003a; the present study). Some have interpreted that the paraphyletic HG C(xC3) reflects the Paleolithic colonization event concerning the peopling of Australia via a southern coastal migration route involving India (Kivisild et al. 1999, 2003a; Underhill et al. 2001a), whereas others (Redd et al. 2002) argued that such C*-defined chromosomes reflects recent (<5 KYA) genetic affinity between Indian tribes and Australian Aborigines."

"On the basis of a broad distribution—involving all social and linguistic categories in India—and relatively high diversification patterns, it can be concluded that representatives of HGs C5-M356, H-M69*, F*, L1, and R2 have ancestry indigenous to the Asian subcontinent."

[Kaiser]

Modal Values for Some C5 (M356) markers

deepak_atreya: Chances are high that you are a C5, based simply on the process of elimination of other sub-clades which do not belong in South Indian upper castes.

Further to my previous post, I checked your surname and presume your ySearch ID to be 7HJZP. If that is correct, your values for some markers are typical of C5 (M-356) as per Sengupta's study:

DYS 388 = 13 (C3 has a modal value of 14 at this marker)
DYS 390 = 23 (C1 & C3 have modal values of 24 & 25 at this marker)
DYS 393 = 14 (C3 has a modal value of 13 at this marker)
DYS 19/394 = 15 (C3 has a modal value of 16 for this marker)

Thus, most likey a C5!

[deepak_atreya]

Wow! thanks stevo and kaiser for ur super quick and enlightening response!!

Stevo,
I did go through the excel sheet before posting, i obviously (with only few samples of C) dont have perfect match for any 12 markers... now i wnated to know which markers would be most appropriate to itinguish between c* and c5 conclusively....

Kaiser,
Thanks alot for going through all that effort!! yeah i belong to so called upper caste ...iyengars to be precise which is techincally same as iyers whom you have mentioned in your post.....

Do you have any idea what are the Modal str values C5 marker...which are the markers to be taken in to consideration while ditinguishing C* and C5 , I am not c3 ( as you say , that is eliminated ,), that reconfirms what i had thought before, that my ancestors were all from south India. Now how can I eliminate C* or C5 . I dont want to do that on the basis of caste, bcos sample size tested for any caste in most of the studies about India is very small. I cant probably explain here the sheer magnitude and complexity of anthropolgy in India, believe me all the sample size of a particular caste in India in most of the studies is so small, I bielieve its futile to come to any sort of conclusion based on caste.

anyway with the info i have got now from you people i will continue my research on net...in the mean time any help will be much appreciated!

[Kaiser]

deepak_atreya: As I understand, you now need to resolve between C* and C5. Well, a simplistic approach would be to take a lead from Sengupta's observation: "The new subclade C5-M356 accounts for 85% of the former C* Hgs. Although its overall frequency is only 1.4% in the Indian sample, it occurs in all linguistic groups and in both tribes and castes." C* proper, on the other hand, was found in just 2 out of 728 subjects. As for modal values of C* that you could use for comparison with your own, I am not aware of a study which gives them.

The ySearch listing of Hg C (undifferentiated) is indeed intriguing as the 18 individuals seem to be spread all over the globe. So I suspect that when differentiated, these C-types would belong to some non-Indian sub-clade, perhaps C3 or something. (Genghis Khan really sowed his oats well!!)

I am sure we will soon nail your sub-clade (for free)!