TY - JOUR
T1 - Plasmodium falciparum Accompanied the Human Expansion out of Africa
AU - Tanabe, Kazuyuki
AU - Mita, Toshihiro
AU - Jombart, Thibaut
AU - Eriksson, Anders
AU - Horibe, Shun
AU - Palacpac, Nirianne
AU - Ranford-Cartwright, Lisa
AU - Sawai, Hiromi
AU - Sakihama, Naoko
AU - Ohmae, Hiroshi
AU - Nakamura, Masatoshi
AU - Ferreira, Marcelo U.
AU - Escalante, Ananias A.
AU - Prugnolle, Franck
AU - Björkman, Anders
AU - Färnert, Anna
AU - Kaneko, Akira
AU - Horii, Toshihiro
AU - Manica, Andrea
AU - Kishino, Hirohisa
AU - Balloux, Francois
N1 - Funding Information:
This study is dedicated to the late David Walliker. We thank all those who participated in the epidemiological studies for their kind cooperation, particularly I. Rooth, M. Dzodzomenyo, H. Eto, T. Tsukahara, F. Hombhanje, H. Osawa, I. Hwaihwanje, K. Hirayama, K. Na-Bangchang, A. Palanca, Jr., R. Espina, and B. Bakote'e. We also want to acknowledge three anonymous reviewers for insightful suggestions. This work was supported by the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology, Japan (18073013), Japan Society for the Promotion of Sciences (18GS03140013, 20390120), the Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare (H21-Shinkou-ippan), and Takeda Science Foundation, Japan. A.E. and A.M. were funded by the Leverhulme Trust. F.B. and A.M. acknowledge financial support from the Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council and the Medical Research Council.
PY - 2010
Y1 - 2010
N2 - Plasmodium falciparum is distributed throughout the tropics and is responsible for an estimated 230 million cases of malaria every year, with a further 1.4 billion people at risk of infection [1-3]. Little is known about the genetic makeup of P. falciparum populations, despite variation in genetic diversity being a key factor in morbidity, mortality, and the success of malaria control initiatives. Here we analyze a worldwide sample of 519 P. falciparum isolates sequenced for two housekeeping genes (63 single nucleotide polymorphisms from around 5000 nucleotides per isolate). We observe a strong negative correlation between within-population genetic diversity and geographic distance from sub-Saharan Africa (R 2 = 0.95) over Africa, Asia, and Oceania. In contrast, regional variation in transmission intensity seems to have had a negligible impact on the distribution of genetic diversity. The striking geographic patterns of isolation by distance observed in P. falciparum mirror the ones previously documented in humans [4-7] and point to a joint sub-Saharan African origin between the parasite and its host. Age estimates for the expansion of P. falciparum further support that anatomically modern humans were infected prior to their exit out of Africa and carried the parasite along during their colonization of the world.
AB - Plasmodium falciparum is distributed throughout the tropics and is responsible for an estimated 230 million cases of malaria every year, with a further 1.4 billion people at risk of infection [1-3]. Little is known about the genetic makeup of P. falciparum populations, despite variation in genetic diversity being a key factor in morbidity, mortality, and the success of malaria control initiatives. Here we analyze a worldwide sample of 519 P. falciparum isolates sequenced for two housekeeping genes (63 single nucleotide polymorphisms from around 5000 nucleotides per isolate). We observe a strong negative correlation between within-population genetic diversity and geographic distance from sub-Saharan Africa (R 2 = 0.95) over Africa, Asia, and Oceania. In contrast, regional variation in transmission intensity seems to have had a negligible impact on the distribution of genetic diversity. The striking geographic patterns of isolation by distance observed in P. falciparum mirror the ones previously documented in humans [4-7] and point to a joint sub-Saharan African origin between the parasite and its host. Age estimates for the expansion of P. falciparum further support that anatomically modern humans were infected prior to their exit out of Africa and carried the parasite along during their colonization of the world.
KW - EVO-ECOL
KW - HUMDISEASE
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UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/citedby.url?scp=78049530040&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1016/j.cub.2010.05.053
DO - 10.1016/j.cub.2010.05.053
M3 - Article
C2 - 20656209
AN - SCOPUS:78049530040
SN - 0960-9822
VL - 20
SP - 1283
EP - 1289
JO - Current Biology
JF - Current Biology
IS - 14
ER -