Some of the first humans in the Americas came from China, study finds

[Judi Lynn]

New genetics study finds some of the first arrivals came during the last ice age, and shortly after, in two distinct migrations

Agence France-Presse
Tue 9 May 2023 12.59 EDT

Some of the first humans to arrive in the Americas included people from what is now China, who arrived in two distinct migrations during and after the last ice age, a new genetics study has found.

“Our findings indicate that besides the previously indicated ancestral sources of Native Americans in Siberia, the northern coastal China also served as a genetic reservoir contributing to the gene pool,” said Yu-Chun Li, one of the report authors.

Li added that during the second migration, the same lineage of people settled in Japan, which could help explain similarities in prehistoric arrowheads and spears found in the Americas, China and Japan.

. . .

More recent research, from the late 2000s onwards, has signaled that more diverse sources from Asia could be connected to an ancient lineage responsible for founding populations across the Americas, including in Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Ecuador, Mexico and California.

More:
https://www.theguardian.com/science/2023/may/09/prehistoric-migrations-china-americas

[Bernardo de La Paz]

1. Lesson: climate change leads to population upheavals

I had heard about the two waves finding a few years ago and this adds credence. The China angle is new and the Ainu people's connection in Japan is fascinating.

I find interesting the name similarities of Ainu, Aleut, Inuit, and Innu; groups of northern indigenous people.

[wnylib]

2. Interesting details, but we already knew

from mtDNA haplotypes A, B, C, and D that Native Americans share haplotypes with the people of China. The mtDNA haplotype X among Native Americans is from Siberia and accounts for a far smaller group of Native Americans.

Before this article, I had read only one source about a genetic link between the Ainu and Native Americans, but I can see a resemblance between the two groups.

ON EDIT: Some physical features that are common among Native Americans are absent among the Chinese and Japanese, so apparently there were mutations in Asia or in the Americas, or in both places, since the first people migrated to North and South America.