Genetic structure of a Sakha population from Siberia and ethnic affinities

Human Biology, Apr 1999 by Pakendorf, B, Spitsyn, V A, Rodewald, A

Abstract The red cell enzymes ACP1, ESD, GLO1, PGM1, and RDS and the serum proteins GC, HP, PI, and TF were determined for samples of 150 and 144 Sakha, respectively. The Sakha, a Turkic-speaking population, inhabit the Sakha-Yakutia Republic in northeastern Siberia. High gene frequencies were found for ACP1 *A, GLO1 *1, and GC*1F, whereas no PI*S or PI*Z alleles were found. In addition, I heterozygous phenotype with ACP1 *C and 2 heterozygous phenotypes with ESD*7 were found. The genetic distance measures show close affinities of the Sakha population to Buryats (especially Western Buryats), Mongols, and Evenks, whereas the genetic distance to Turkic-speaking Altay and Tuvan populations is great.

The Sakha (also known as Yakuts) are the only Turkic-speaking population group living in the northern regions of eastern Siberia and are surrounded by the Tungus-speaking Evenks and Evens (Figure 1). They were seminomadic cattle herders and horse breeders until the collectivization efforts of the Soviets and differed completely in their way of life from their neighbors, who were hunters or reindeer herders (Forsyth 1992).

The territory of the Sakha-Yakutia Republic was not originally inhabited by the ancestors of the Sakha, who migrated to this area 5 to 10 centuries ago. The original inhabitants were the Yukagirs and, along the Vilyuy River, the Evenks. The ethnogenesis of the Sakha has long interested archeologists, ethnologists, and anthropologists (Levin and Potapov 1961; Tokarev and Gurvich 1964; Okladnikov 1970; Boeva 1988). Archeologists have uncovered rock paintings and cultural objects on the northwestern shore of Lake Baikal attributed to the Kurykan people, who were cattle and horse breeders. Their pottery and the decorations on bridles and the riding dress show similarities with those of the Sakha. Okladnikov (1970) interpreted the Kurykans to be the forebears of the Sakha, who at some point in history wandered northward along the Lena River. This point is corroborated by the linguistic evidence, because the language of the Sakha contains a great number of words of Buryat and Mongol origin, and by the similarities in lifestyle between nomadic populations of Central Asia and the Sakha (Okladnikov 1970). Russian scientists agree that the Sakha migrated northward from the south, but they hold differing views of the degree of assimilation of the Evenks.

In this study, by using blood protein markers, we examined the genetic structure and ethnic affinities of a Sakha population from the Vilyuy River area in eastern Siberia with the objective of elucidating their ethnogenesis.

Materials and Methods

During an expedition in 1993, L.A. Tarskaya collected blood samples in 2 villages, Namtsy and Dalyr, near the Vilyuy River in the Verkhne-Vilyuyskiy district. The aim of the expedition was to assess the health effects of the high environmental pollution, resulting from mining and the diamond-- processing industry in the city of Mirniy on the upper reaches of the Vilyuy River. The probands voluntarily gave blood samples and answered a detailed questionnaire, which enabled us to disregard all samples from people who were not Sakha or whose parents were not Sakha. The blood samples were separated into serum and blood clots by centrifugation on the evening of sampling. They were then frozen, and after being transported to Moscow, were stored at - 30 deg C until use in this study. Hemolysate was obtained by repeated thawing and freezing of the samples.

The following red cell enzymes (N = 150) were determined by isoelectric focusing: ACP1 in an agarose gel after the method of Miller et al. (1987), ESD in a polyacrylamide gel after the method of Divall (1984), PGM1 in a polyacrylamide gel, and RDS (rhodanese), which was dyed after the method of Scott and Wright (1980). GLO1 was determined by conventional electrophoresis in a vertical polyacrylamide gel with starch added. The serum protein PI was determined by isoelectric focusing in an agarose gel, whereas GC and TF were determined in a polyacrylamide gel with Immobilines after the method of Gorg et al. (1983). HP was determined by conventional electrophoresis in a vertical polyacrylamide gel with a small amount of hemolysate mixed with the serum sample (N = 144).

Gene frequencies and an estimation of Hardy-Weinberg equilibrium were calculated. Based on the gene frequencies, genetic distance measures D^sub a^,according to Nei et al. (1983)] were computed with the program DSW (Shriver et al. 1995), using data from the literature as a comparison. Because it was difficult to find data on all systems used in this study for a large number of Siberian populations, 3 different computations of genetic distance were performed, with progressively smaller numbers of systems and larger numbers of populations included. The results were clustered according to the unweighted pair group method with arithmetic mean (UPGMA), and a bootstrap analysis with 1000 bootstraps was performed on the resulting dendrograms. A principal components analysis was also performed using sPss.