Population Genetics


Research topics:
  • The Geographic Population Structure (GPS) tool
  • The origin of Ashkenazic Jews and Yiddish
  • The origin of Druze
  • Microarray design
  • The apportionment of human genetic variation
  • Data Compression
  • Biogeographic variation in plant community
  • References

    • The search for a method that utilizes biological information to predict humans’ place of origin has occupied scientists for millennia. Over the past four decades, scientists have employed genetic data in an effort to achieve this goal but with limited success. While biogeographical algorithms using next-generation sequencing data have achieved an accuracy of 700 km in Europe, they were inaccurate elsewhere.

    The Geographic Population Structure (GPS) tool is the most accurate tool for predicting recent geographic origin of any world population. The tool was publised in Nature Communications with highlights in Science (Genetic 'App' Tells You Where You're From) and Nature Communications (Genes give clues to where in the World you came from).

    In Elhaik et al. (2014a), we developed a new paradigm that assumes all humans are admixed from different gene pools (below) and showed how this model can be utilized to accurately infer the geographical origin of populations down to home village (circles below represent the median predicted distance to home village).



    My lab has led the development of the tool and will continue developing advanced tools as well as GPS applicaitons for non-humans.

    This work was widely covered by the media (see Press).

    The origin of Ashkenazic Jews and their language, Yiddish, have been the subject of controversy for over three centuries and has yet to be resolved. The "Rhineland hypothesis" depicts Eastern European Jews as a "population isolate" that emerged from a small group of German Jews who migrated eastward and expanded rapidly through a miracle. Alternatively, the "Khazarian hypothesis" or "Irano-Turko-Slavic hypothesis" suggests that Eastern European Jews descended from an anamalgam of Turkic clans that settled the Caucasus in the early centuries A.D. and converted to Judaism during the first Millennium.

    In Elhaik (2013), we tested the genetic diversity among European Jews in light of the two hypotheses: the Rhineland Hypothesis (the narrative) and the competing Khazarian Hypothesis. The results unambiguously support the Khazarian Hypothesis, portraying the European Jewish genome as a tapestry of ancient ancestries and high heterogeneity. This is the most popular paper published in GBE. It was ranked #1 most-read paper since its publication. This work was widely covered by the media (see Press).

    In Des et al. (2016), we aimed to identify the origin of Yiddish. Since language, genetics, and geography are correlated we reasoned that the geographical origin of Yiddish can be derived from the geographical origin of the DNA of Yiddish speaking Ashkenazic Jews. To infer the geographical origin of their genomes, we applied the Geographic Population Structure (GPS) tool to the genomes of over 360 "Yiddish speaking" 180 "non-Yiddish speaking" Ashkenazic Jews. We traced their genomes to northeast Turkey where we uncovered four villages whose name may be derived from the word "Ashkenaz."
    Unsurprisingly, it seems that Ashkenazic Jews and their language have originated in Ashkenaz. This is the largest study on Ashkenazic Jews, to date, and the first to study the genomes of Yiddish speakers.

    The paper was ranked #1 most-read paper in GBE since its publication.
    This work was widely covered by the media (see Press).

    In Elhaik (2016), we questioned claims that there exist Jewish biomarkers. We did that by posing a public "Jewish genome challenge" where scientists, public members, and 23andme were asked to distinguish between Jewish and non-Jewish genomes in a blind setting. All testers have failed. We next compared the genetic distances between Jewish communities and show that they are genetically distinct from each other and from a simulated population of Judaeans (below).
    Lastly, we discuss common fallacies in the literature that support the existence of these biomarkers.
    To learn more, see three population science articles that I wrote for: The Conversation, Aeon, and Atlas of science.

    In Das et al. (2017), we replied to the criticism of Das et al. (2016). We showed that all biogeographical analyses on AJs identified Turkey as the place of DNA origin and carried out ancient DNA analysis. We also showed that AJs have ancient Irano-Turkish origins and practically no Levantine ancestry.


    The origin of Druze remained unknown for almost a thousand years. The Druze people who live almost exclusively in the mountains of Syria, Lebanon and Israel have captivated linguists, historians, and sociologists, who have not been able to agree whether the Druze are of Arabian, Turkish, Caucasus or Persian origin. In Marshall et al. (2016), we applied GPS to the genomes of Druze and Levantine populations from the region to find the geographical origins. Unlike other Levantine populations, Druze were predicted to some of the tallest mountains in the Near East, in agreement with their propensity to live in high altitudes. By contrast, most of their Levantine neighbors were predicted southern of Turkey.



    We confirmed these findings with an ancient DNA by showing that Druze exhibit a much higher similarity to ancient Aremnians than to ancient Levantine populations, as opposed to modern-day Levantine populations that exhibit the opposute patterns.

    Our findings were published in here.

    Designing the GenoChip microarray to study human populations is one of the most important endeavors done in population genetics to promote the field of genetic geneaology.

    I led the development of the microarray and all online tests now used routinly by the Genographic Poject. My lab continues collaborating with the Genographic Project and collaborators in addressing quesitons related to human history, migraitons, admixture, and linguistics.

    In (Elhaik et al. 2013), we announced the development of the GenoCh