ABSTRACT
This chapter examines the role that genetic data has had in answering the questions about the population history of the first Americans. The first Americans were migrants dispersing out of Asia about 15,000 years ago. Patterns of human biological diversity support de Acosta's idea of an Asian origin of the first Americans. Early views tended to interpret population history in terms of supposed biological uniformity of Native Americans. Initial work on the Y chromosome showed a single major haplotype found at high frequencies in a number of Native American populations, a finding that was suggested to reflect a single origin of Native Americans. The oldest Native American remains tend to be somewhat different from those of recent Native Americans. Molecular genetic data have confirmed the Asian origins of Native Americans suggested by earlier studies of blood groups, other genetic markers, and physical traits.
