2) Colonization of East Asia and the New World. Genetic variation in Asian and New World indigenous populations is analyzed in order to reconstruct original colonization events and subsequent migrations.  Questions of interest include the original settlement of East Asia and its influence on colonization of neighboring regions. The number, timing and genetic make-up of colonizing migration(s) to the New World is of particular interest.  Mitochondrial, X and Y, and autosomal genes and variants are assayed in order to provide the most complete and accurate representation of these events.  Specific populations and regions of interest include Mongolia, Siberia, and China in Asia and Panama and US Native American populations in the Americas.  Larissa Tarskaia (visiting professor from Yakutsk, Siberia) collected over 2000 Siberian  DNA samples and began an analysis of mitochondrial variation in these populations.  Graduate student Rebecca Gray has completed a study on the unusually high level of variation we detected at the mitochondrial 9bp locus in the Sakha of Siberia.  Collaboration with Khishge Sambuughin (NINDS, NIH), Lev Goldfarb (NINDS, NIH), Ke Xu (NIAAA, NIH), Ma Cui (Guangzhou Psychiatric Hospital, China), Jeff Long (University of Michigan), David Goldman (NIAAA, NIH), Rick Kittles (Howard University), and Anne Stone (Arizona State University).