Fine-scale population structure within and among Malagasy societies

Abstract

The population of Madagascar exhibits a globally unique combination of African and Asian genetic ancestries. Previous studies have described the admixture history of Madagascar at island-wide scales [1,2], but less focus has been paid to fine-scale population structure across the island. We present new genome-wide genetic data from 192 individuals sampled across five regions of Madagascar. We identify population structure at extremely fine spatial scales ([~]10 km) among the Merina of the central highlands. By analysing subpopulations separately, we found one Merina group exhibited similarity to coastal populations in f4 ratios, estimated admixture dates, and pairwise FST distances, while another group was similar to other highland individuals in the same measures. This fine-scale substructure is likely associated with historical coastal-to-highland migration during the 18th and 19th centuries. In contrast, we also observe macro-scale structure in estimated timing of admixture across the island, with southeastern coastal groups exhibiting the earliest estimated admixture timings, and northern groups exhibiting the latest. This pattern corroborates previous results [1,2], and may suggest differing histories of admixture timing among Malagasy populations. Our results emphasise the importance of deep micro-geographic sampling to complement macro-scale analysis when characterising demographic history.