Paragroup

Paragroup is a term in population genetics that describes lines within a haplogroup that are not defined by any additional unique marker that determines their belonging to any named subclade of this haplogroup. They are standardly indicated by an asterisk ( * ) after the main letter designation of the haplogroup ^[1] . The term “paragroup” is an abbreviation (“ fold ”) from the term “ paraphyletic haplogroup ”, indicating that paragroups form paraphyletic branches ^[1] . Unlike lines that are defined as child branches, paragroups may not have any additional unique markers. On the other hand, among carriers of a paragroup, there may also be carriers of unique tags that have not yet been opened. If a unique marker is opened inside the paragroup, which is not distributed throughout the entire paragroup, but only in its noticeable part, then this specific line is given a unique name, and it is removed from the paragroup, now forming an independent sub-branch.

An example of a paragroup is Haplogroup DE * . It contains a marker that defines the haplogroup DE, but there are no markers that would determine its most common sub-branches - haplogroup D and haplogroup E ^[2] . An example of a line within a paragroup to which a new name has been assigned is haplogroup E1b1b1g . This haplogroup was formerly part of the E1b1b1 * group (also known as e3b * or E-M35 *) until the marker M293 was opened in 2008 ^[3] .

Another example: a representative of Y-DNA of haplogroup R (defined by marker M207), may also refer to a subhaplogroup R1 (defined by marker M173) or R2 (defined by marker M124). Individuals having M207 but not having M173 or M124 mutations will fall into the R * group.

In the case of some haplogroups, carriers of the paragroup have not yet been fixed, that is, in these cases, all known carriers of a haplogroup simultaneously belong to one of its branches. Such, for example, haplogroup I or macrogroup IJ .

Since new haplogroups (and subgroups) often arise after migration of part of the carriers of the parent haplogroup, the distribution region of a certain group in many cases differs markedly from the distribution region of its daughter groups and can be considered in such cases as the probable region of origin of ancestors of carriers of descendant branches (in other words, carriers of the paragroup are always more distantly related to carriers of the subclade group than the latter between themselves).