Page 102 - THE MELANESIA DIASPORA FILE CETAK ISI 10022017

show distinct haplotypes. The other marker used for mitochondrial DNA analysis is the
presence or absence a single base variation on the coding genes called Single Nucleotide
Polymorphism (SNP). Another important population-specific marker is mtDNA deletion
in the form of missing nine base pairs of DNA in the mtDNA. These markers found on
the mtDNA increase the level of differentiation between individuals as well as between
populations. For population genetic studies, a large data bank is needed because mtDNA
does not experience recombination which means a particular mtDNA sequence or
haplotype is treated as a single locus. The larger the number of unrelated individuals in the
database, the more meaningful this is in the statistical calculations.
The genetic structure of the Indonesian people is better understood if placed in the
context of the genetic map of Asia. According to Cann et al. (1987), all Asian mtDNA is
divided into two macro haplogroups. This division is based on the presence or absence
of SNP at nucleotide/base 10394 which also gives the branching of European mtDNA. In
addition, every Asian mtDNA also has SNP at nucleotide 10397. The macro haplogroup
which determined based on SNP10394 and SNP10397 is called macro haplogroup M. The
constant relationship between these two SNPs (10394 and 10397) in Asia shows that 10397
might come from mtDNA at the SNP10394 site when women migrated from Africa to
Asia. Besides the Asian mtDNA branching, there is also another type of haplogroup such
as haplogroup A which has SNP663 and a haplogroup which is determined based on 9-bp
deletion between the COII gene and tRNA as well as SNP16517.
Lys
As one of the genetic source of dispersal, Southern China is known to have been
inhabited by the Liujiang people from around 30,000 years ago. Many anthropology data
support Southern China as the origin of many ethnic populations in East Asia as well as
the Pacific. The important role of Southern China to the Indonesian archipelago is that
it is believed to be the ancestral homeland of the Austronesian-speaking people. These
people, believed to have originated in Southern China left Taiwan around 6,000 years ago,
and moved southward, eventually reaching the Indonesian archipelago (Bellwood, 2005,
Diamond, 1988). From a study of the Daic population, it was found that several major
haplogroups like B4a, F1a, M7b1, B5a, M7b, M*, R9a, and R9b made up 48.8% of all the
haplogroups (Li et al., 2007).

102 Chapter 2

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