Paragroup is a term used in

population genetics Population genetics is a subfield of genetics that deals with genetic differences within and between populations, and is a part of evolutionary biology. Studies in this branch of biology examine such phenomena as adaptation, speciation, and pop ...

to describe lineages within a

haplogroup A haplotype is a group of alleles in an organism that are inherited together from a single parent, and a haplogroup (haploid from the el, ἁπλοῦς, ''haploûs'', "onefold, simple" and en, group) is a group of similar haplotypes that share ...

that are not defined by any additional unique markers. In

human Y-chromosome DNA haplogroup In human genetics, a human Y-chromosome DNA haplogroup is a haplogroup defined by mutations in the non- recombining portions of DNA from the male-specific Y chromosome (called Y-DNA). Many people within a haplogroup share similar numbers of sh ...

s, paragroups are typically represented by an

asterisk The asterisk ( ), from Late Latin , from Ancient Greek , ''asteriskos'', "little star", is a typographical symbol. It is so called because it resembles a conventional image of a heraldic star. Computer scientists and mathematicians often voc ...

(*) placed after the main haplogroup. The term "paragroup" is a

portmanteau A portmanteau word, or portmanteau (, ) is a blend of wordsparaphyletic In taxonomy (general), taxonomy, a group is paraphyletic if it consists of the group's most recent common ancestor, last common ancestor and most of its descendants, excluding a few Monophyly, monophyletic subgroups. The group is said to be pa ...

indicating that paragroups form paraphyletic subclades. Apart from the mutations that define the parent haplogroup, paragroups may not possess any additional unique markers. Alternatively paragroups may possess unique markers that have not been discovered. If a unique marker is discovered within a paragroup, the specific lineage is given a unique name and is moved out of the paragroup to form an independent subclade. For example, the paragroup of human Y-DNA Haplogroup DE is DE*. A member of DE* has the marker that defines DE, but not the markers that define DE's only known immediate subclades, haplogroups D and E. Likewise, haplogroup E1b1b1g (also known as E-M293) is an example of a relatively new subclade, discovered within a previously designated paragroup and assigned a new name. Until the SNP/UEP marker M293 was discovered in 2008, the members of the subclade were indistinguishable from other components of the paragroup E1b1b1* (also known as E3b* and E-M35*). Another example is a member of the

Y-DNA The Y chromosome is one of two sex chromosomes (allosomes) in therian mammals, including humans, and many other animals. The other is the X chromosome. Y is normally the sex-determining chromosome in many species, since it is the presence or abse ...

haplogroup R Haplogroup R may refer to: * Haplogroup R (mtDNA), a human mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) haplogroup * Haplogroup R (Y-DNA), a human Y-chromosome (Y-DNA) haplogroup {{Disambig ...

(defined by marker M207) may belong to the sub-haplogroup R1 (defined by marker M173) or R2 (defined by marker M124). Individuals with neither of these mutations would be categorised as belonging to haplogroup R*.

References

{{haplogroups Genetic genealogy Human haplogroups