1. ¹Institute of Genetic Medicine, European Academy Bozen/Bolzano (EURAC), Bolzano, Italy (Affiliated Institute of the University Lübeck, Germany)
2. ²Department of Human Genetics, The University of Chicago, Chicago, IL, USA
3. ³Department of Neurology, University of Lübeck, Lübeck, Germany
4. ⁴Department of Neurology, Central Regional Hospital, Bolzano, Italy

Correspondence: Dr I Pichler or Dr PP Pramstaller, Institute of Genetic Medicine, European Academy, Viale Druso 1, Bolzano 39100, Italy. Tel: +39 0471 055512; Fax: +39 0471 055599; E-mails: irene.pichler@eurac.edu or peter.pramstaller@eurac.edu

Received 15 October 2008; Revised 30 July 2009; Accepted 10 August 2009; Published online 21 October 2009.

Abstract

Although the North American Hutterites trace their origins to South Tyrol, no attempts have been made to examine the genetic migration history of the Hutterites before emigrating to the United States in the 1870s. To investigate this, we studied 9 microsatellite loci and 11 unique event polymorphism (UEP) markers on the Y-chromosome, the hypervariable region I (HVRI) of the mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA), as well as the complete mtDNA genome of Hutterite and South Tyrolean samples. Only 6 out of 14 Y-chromosome UEP+microsatellite haplotypes and 3 out of 11 mitochondrial haplotypes that were present in the Hutterites were also present in the South Tyrolean population. The phylogenetic relationships inferred from Y-chromosome and mtDNA databases show that the Hutterites have a unique genetic background related to a similar extent to central and eastern European populations. An admixture analysis indicates, however, a relatively high genetic contribution of central European populations to the Hutterite gene pool. These results are consistent with historical records on Hutterite migrations and demographic history. In addition, our data reveal similar numbers of Y and mitochondrial haplotypes in Hutterite male and female founders, respectively. The Hutterite male and female gene pools are similar with respect to genetic diversity and genetic distance measures and comparable with respect to their origins, suggesting a similar evolutionary history.