First Venezuelan: coming by coastal route

First Venezuelan: coming by coastal route

A study of the oldest known sample of human DNA in the Americas suggests that humans arrived in the New World relatively recently, around 15,000 years ago. The DNA was extracted from a 10,300-year-old tooth found in a cave on Prince of Wales Island off southern Alaska in 1996. The sample represents a previously unknown lineage for the people who first arrived in the Americas. The findings, published last week online in the American Journal of Physical Anthropology, shed light on how the descendants of the Alaskan caveman might have spread.

Brian Kemp, a molecular anthropologist who sequenced the DNA, said the discovery underlines the importance of genetic research in understanding human migration.
"I think there's a lot of information in these old skeletons that's going to help us clarify the timing of the peopling of the Americas and perhaps where Native Americans originated in Asia," said Kemp, a research associate at Vanderbilt University in Nashville, Tennessee.

This migration probably occurred at least 15,000 years ago—the oldest human remains discovered so far are 13,000 years old—but some scientists have proposed that the first Americans arrived up to 40,000 years ago.

But where did these coastal migrants come from?
DNA samples of people living in Japan and northeast Asia show some of the genetic mutations found in the cave-tooth and Chumash samples.

Finally, are the first Venezuelan linked to the cave-tooth and Chumash samples?

Initial clues based on Sinodont dentition (a group of carateristics usually identify on asian and Native American people) found in some Venezuelan skeleton (L.Lemoine & Camilo Tapia) suggest a link to the first Venezuelan lineage. A DNA test is probably the latest tool to clarify this interesting point.

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2007/02/070202-human-migration.html