To elucidate the human being colonization process of northern Asia and human dispersals to the Americas, a diverse subset of 71 mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) lineages was chosen for complete genome sequencing from the collection of 1,432 control-region sequences sampled from 18 autochthonous populations of northern, central, eastern, and southwestern Asia. to rule out the presence of a northern Asian route for the initial human colonization of Asia. The territory of northern Asia is of crucial importance for the study of early human dispersal and the peopling of the Americas. Recent findings about the peopling of northern Asia reconstructed by paleoanthropologists and archaeologists suggest 305-01-1 supplier that modern humans colonized the southern a part of Siberia 45,000C35,000 years ago. It seems that almost all of northern Asia, including extreme northeastern Siberia, had been colonized by modern humans by 15,000 years ago.1C3 Over the past few years, a number of genetic studies about populations from different parts of Siberia were conducted.4C15 Molecular evidence suggests that ancestral Native American populations may have emerged from this region of northern Asia, since several maternally and paternally inherited genetic lineages present in both Siberia and the Americas appear to have evolved 305-01-1 supplier in that region of northern Asia.4,16C18 Recent studies have also revealed the presence 305-01-1 supplier of both eastern and western Eurasian lineages in gene pools of modern populations of southern Siberia, a pattern that probably reflects a complex history of population movements and interactions since the Paleolithic period.8,11,13,15 However, such issues as timing, origin, and routes of founding migrations to Siberia and the Americas remain ambiguous and controversial. Because of a new phase of development of genetic studies that is based on complete mitochondrial genome analyses, our chances to improve the phylogenetic resolution of the mtDNA tree and, consequently, to define the timing and path of human dispersions more are taking place repeatedly precisely. The introduction of finish mtDNA sequences managed to get feasible to reconstruct the phylogenies of African, European, Oceanian, eastern Asian, southeastern Asian, and Indian lineages and to gain detailed insight into human evolution and pioneer settlement processes.19C34 Meanwhile, such systematic analyses have not yet been available for northern Asian populations. Recent analyses of a large data set of eastern Asian total mtDNA sequences have provided a significant refinement of the eastern Asian mtDNA phylogeny,27,32 which is undoubtedly useful for northern Asian mtDNA phylogeny reconstruction. Nevertheless, to date, only two studies dealing with total mtDNA variation in northern Asian populations have been 305-01-1 supplier published.9,14 The first study reported the analysis of complete mtDNA sequences of haplogroup D2 that are F3 fixed in the gene pool of the Aleuts of the Commander Islands.9 The second study presented the set of different mtDNA lineages characterizing the gene pools of aboriginal populations from the Altai-Sayan Upland and the Lower Amur/Sea of Okhotsk regions.14 Both studies focused primarily around the peopling of the Americas, whereas the problems of initial human colonization of northern Asia fell beyond the scope of those studies. Recent models based on mtDNA evidence suggest a single human dispersal out of Africa by a southern coastal route to India and farther, to East Asia and Australasia.26,29,30,33,35 However, the early arrival in southern Siberia of Upper Palaeolithic technology from the Middle East (40,000 years ago) has often been interpreted as support for the existence of another migration route from Africa toward East Asia through the Levant and farther along the northern Asian route through central Asia and southern Siberia.36 This scenario suggests that unique mtDNA lineages that cannot be derived from southern and southeastern Asian variation should be found in northern and central Asian populations.37 It is worth noting, however, that mtDNA-variation studies of modern Siberian populations have shown a lack of basal M, N, and R lineages in the mtDNA tree of northern Asians.6,11,38 This should be considered.