The peopling of the Pacific from a bacterial perspective.

Yoshan Moodley (1) , Bodo Linz (1) , Yoshio Yamaoka (2) , Helen M Windsor (3) , Sebastien Breurec (4, 5) , Jeng-Yih Wu (6) , Ayas Maady (7) , Steffie Bernhöft (1) , Jean-Michel Thiberge (8) , Suparat Phuanukoonnon (9) , Gangolf Jobb (10) , Peter Siba (9) , David y Graham (11) , Barry J Marshall (3) , Mark Achtman (1, 12)

1 Department of Molecular Biology [MPIIB Berlin]
2 Department of Medecine-Gastroenterology
3 Scool of Biomedical
4 Bactériologie médicale et Environnementale
5 Institut Pasteur de Nouvelle-Calédonie
6 Department of Gastroenterology
7 Department of Endoscopy
8 PF8 - Génotypage des Pathogènes et Santé Publique (Plate-forme)
9 PNG-IMR - Papua New Guinea Institute of Medical Research
10 Fritz-Kortner-Bogen 36
11 Digestive Disease Division
12 Environmental Research Institute and Department of Microbiology

Two prehistoric migrations peopled the Pacific. One reached New Guinea and Australia, and a second, more recent, migration extended through Melanesia and from there to the Polynesian islands. These migrations were accompanied by two distinct populations of the specific human pathogen Helicobacter pylori, called hpSahul and hspMaori, respectively. hpSahul split from Asian populations of H. pylori 31,000 to 37,000 years ago, in concordance with archaeological history. The hpSahul populations in New Guinea and Australia have diverged sufficiently to indicate that they have remained isolated for the past 23,000 to 32,000 years. The second human expansion from Taiwan 5000 years ago dispersed one of several subgroups of the Austronesian language family along with one of several hspMaori clades into Melanesia and Polynesia, where both language and parasite have continued to diverge.

Domains: Bacteriology

Yoshan Moodley, Bodo Linz, Yoshio Yamaoka, Helen M Windsor, Sebastien Breurec, et al.. The peopling of the Pacific from a bacterial perspective.. Science, 2009, 323 (5913), pp.527-30. ⟨10.1126/science.1166083⟩. ⟨pasteur-00583978⟩