Maternal genetic architecture of Guizhou's Hmong-Mien populations via whole mitogenome

Abstract

The Hmong-Mien (HM) language family, majorly distributed across southern China and Southeast Asia, has remained underexplored in population genetics, particularly concerning whole mitogenome studies. In this study, we sequenced the whole mitogenomes of 261 individuals from Guizhou Hmong-Mien-speaking populations (HM-G), comprising Miao, Yao, and She individuals. The haplogroup distribution was dominated by southern East Asian haplogroups (B, M7, and F). The neutrality test revealed significantly negative values, and mismatch distribution analyses showed a pronounced unimodal distribution, indicating high genetic diversity and recent population expansion in populations. For a comprehensive understanding of the matrilineal genetic background of the HM-speaking population, we merged whole mitogenome data from 83 populations worldwide. Our findings showed that the HM-G exhibited relatively close genetic distances to HM- and Tai-Kadai-speaking populations from East and Southeast Asia. These results provide crucial insights into the genetic structure and evolutionary history of HM-G.