Objective: To investigate the polymorphism of nine Y-short tandem repeat loci in 117 male individuals from four minority populations of China, and to obtain the polymorphism information in these populations.
Methods: Nine loci in all samples were amplified by PCR. Products were electrophoresed on ABI PRISM 377 DNA sequencer. The electrophoresis result was analyzed by Genotyper 2.0 software. Allele frequencies, diversities and genetic distance were calculated.
Results: Forty-three alleles and 32 haplotypes were found in Manchu population, 43 alleles and 33 haplotypes in Uygur population, 31 alleles and 15 haplotypes in Kirgiz population and 34 alleles and 23 haplotypes in Zhuang population. The closest genetic distance is 0.02530 between Manchu and Uygur, the highest genetic distance is 0.34590 between Kirgiz and Zhuang.
Conclusion: High haplotype diversities were found in four populations. The study of genetic diversity among different populations is useful in research of their origins, migrations and their relationships.