Skip to main content

ORIGINAL RESEARCH article

Front. Genet.
Sec. Evolutionary and Population Genetics
Volume 15 - 2024 | doi: 10.3389/fgene.2024.1493270

Populations of Latvia and Lithuania in the context of some Indo-European and non-Indo-European speaking populations of Europe and India: insights from genetic structure analysis

Provisionally accepted
Gintė Daniūtė Gintė Daniūtė 1Laura Pranckėnienė Laura Pranckėnienė 1,2Jurgis Pakerys Jurgis Pakerys 3Raimonds Rescenko Raimonds Rescenko 4Jānis Kloviņš Jānis Kloviņš 4Vaidutis KUCINSKAS Vaidutis KUCINSKAS 1Alina Urnikyte Alina Urnikyte 1*
  • 1 Department of Human and Medical Genetics, Biomedical Science Institute, Faculty of Medicine, Vilnius University,, Vilnius, Lithuania
  • 2 Vilnius University, Vilnius, Lithuania
  • 3 Department of Baltic studies, Institute for the Languages and Cultures of the Baltic, Vilnius University, Vilnius, Lithuania
  • 4 Latvian Biomedical Research and Study Centre (BMC), Riga, Riga, Latvia

The final, formatted version of the article will be published soon.

    The aim of this study was to investigate the relationship among Lithuanian, Latvian, Indian, and some other populations through a genome-wide data analysis of single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs). Limited data of Baltic populations were mostly compared with geographically closer modern and ancient populations in the past, but no previous investigation has explored their genetic relationships with distant populations, like the ones of India, in detail. To address this, we collected and merged genome-wide SNP data from diverse publicly available sources to create a comprehensive dataset with a substantial sample size especially from Lithuanians and Latvians. Principal component analysis (PCA) and admixture analysis methods were employed to assess the genetic structure and relationship among the populations under investigation. Additionally, we estimated an effective population size (Ne) and divergence time to shed light on potential past events between the Baltic and Indian populations. To gain a broader perspective, we also incorporated ancient and modern populations from different continents into our analyses. Our findings revealed that the Balts, unsurprisingly, have a closer genetic affinity with individuals from Indian population who speak Indo-European languages, compared to other Indian linguistic groups (such as speakers of Dravidian, Austroasiatic, and Sino-Tibetan languages). However, when compared to other populations from the European continent, which also speak Indo-European and some Uralic languages, the Balts did not exhibit a stronger resemblance to Indo-European-speaking Indians. In conclusion, this study provides an overview of the genetic relationship and structure of the populations investigated, along with insights into their divergence times.

    Keywords: Lithuanian population, Latvian population, Indian population, Genetics, population structure

    Received: 08 Sep 2024; Accepted: 28 Oct 2024.

    Copyright: © 2024 Daniūtė, Pranckėnienė, Pakerys, Rescenko, Kloviņš, KUCINSKAS and Urnikyte. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

    * Correspondence: Alina Urnikyte, Department of Human and Medical Genetics, Biomedical Science Institute, Faculty of Medicine, Vilnius University,, Vilnius, Lithuania

    Disclaimer: All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article or claim that may be made by its manufacturer is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.