D. Andrew Merriwether
Education:
PhD, University of Pittsburgh, 1993
About:
Associate Professor of Anthropology and Biology. Molecular anthropology, ancient DNA, population genetics, the peopling of the Americas and the Pacific, origins of domestication of plants and animals, mitochondrial DNA influences on health and disease.
Contact:
andym@binghamton.edu
Research Interests:
My research centers around six main themes: 1) peopling of new landscapes, primarily the peopling of the New World and of Oceania; 2) origins of domestication and diseases of domesticated animals, including camelids, flax, cotton, sweet potato, and bottle gourd; 3) genetics of adaptation and human disease, including adaptation to life at high altitude, genetics of obesity and hypertension, myocarditis, and choanal atresia; 4) population genetic and molecular evolution theory, including estimates of migration and migration routes, population genetics of expanding populations, phylogenetic age estimation; 5) methods for ancient DNA and forensics; and 6) genetics used to test theories of animal behavior, including the humpback whale, chimpanzees, camelids, and mollusks.
Selected Bibliography:
(Last five years)
Merriwether DA (in press) A Mitochondrial Portrait of the Americas. In: The Handbook of North American Indians, edited by Emoke J.E. Szathmary. Smithsonian Press, Washington,DC.
Friedlaender J, Schurr T, Gentz F, Koki G, Friedlaender F, Horvat G, Babb P, Cerchio S, Kaestle F, Schanfield M, Deka R, Yanagihara R, Merriwether DA. (2005) Expanding Southwest Pacific Mitochondrial Haplogroups P and Q. Mol Biol Evol. 22(6):1506-1517.
Robledo R, Scheinfeldt L, Merriwether DA, Thompson F, Friedlaender J. (2003) A 9.1-kb insertion/deletion polymorphism suggests a common pattern of genetic diversity in Island Melanesia. Hum Biol. 75(6): 941-9.
Mitani J, Watts D, Pepper J, and Merriwether DA. (2002) Demographic and social constraints on male chimpanzee behavior. Animal Behaviour.
Friedlaender JS, Gentz F, Green K, Merriwether DA. (2002) A cautionary tale on ancient migration detection: mitochondrial DNA variation in Santa Cruz Islands, Solomon Islands. Hum Biol. 74(3): 453-71.
Merriwether DA, (2002) The Peopling of the New World: A Mitochondrial Perspective. In: "The First Americans: The Pleistocene Colonization of the New World." Proceedings of The Fourth Wattis Symposium. Wattis Symposium Series in Anthropology, Number 25. 1999, San Francisco, CA
O'Foighil D, Jennings R, Park, J-K, and Merriwether DA. (2001) Phylogenetic Relationships of Mid-Oceanic Ridge and Continental Lineages of Lasaea (Mollusca: Bivalvia) in the Northeastern Atlantic. Marine Ecology Progress Series 213:165-175.
Merriwether DA. (2001) Ancient DNA and Kennewick Man: A Review of Tuross and Kolman's Kennewick Man aDNA Report. Current Research in the Pleistocene 17: 97-100.
Merriwether DA, Kemp BM, Crews DE, and Neel JV. (2000). Gene flow and genetic Variation in the Yanomama as revealed by mitochondrial DNA. In: America Past, America Present: Genes and Languages in the Americas and Beyond, ed. by C. Renfrew. (Papers in the Prehistory of Languages.) Cambridge: McDonald Institute for Archaeological Research, 89-124.
Merriwether DA, Kaestle RA, Zemel B, Koki G, Mgone C, Alpers M, and Freidlaender J. (2000) Mitochondrial DNA Variation in the Southwest Pacific. In: Genomic Diversity: Applications in Human Population Genetics, ed. by S.S. Paphia, R. Deka and R. Chakraborty. Plenum Publishers, New York, 153-180.
Mitani JC, Merriwether DA, Zhang C. (2000) Male affiliation, cooperation and kinship in wild chimpanzees. Anim Behav. 59(4): 885-893.
(Other Key Publications)
Merriwether DA, Friedlaender JS, Mediavilla J, Mgone C, Gentz F, Ferrell RE (1999) Mitochondrial DNA variation is an indicator of austronesian influence in Island Melanesia. Am J Phys Anthropol. 110(3): 243-70.
Lu Y, Nerurkar VR, Dashwood WM, Woodward CL, Ablan S, Shikuma CM, Grandinetti A, Chang H, Nguyen HT, Wu Z, Yamamura Y, Boto WO, Merriwether DA, Kurata T, Detels R, Yanagihara R. (1999) Genotype and allele frequency of a 32-base pair deletion mutation in the CCR5 gene in various ethnic groups: absence of mutation among Asians and Pacific Islanders. Int J Infect Dis. 3(4):186-91.
Banks D, Constantine G, LaFrance RA and Merriwether DA. (1999). Analysis of Pairwise Differences of DNA Sequences. Journal of Non-Parametric Statistics 11(1): 215-232.
Merriwether DA, Huston S, Iyengar S, Hamman R, Norris JM., Shetterly SM., Kamboh MI and Ferrell RE. (1997). Mitochondrial versus Nuclear Admixture Estimates Demonstrates a Past History of Directional Mating. Am J Phys Anthropol 102: 153-159.
Merriwether DA, Reed DM, and Ferrell RE. (1997). mtDNA variation in ancient and contemporary Mayans. In: Bones of the Ancestors: Recent Studies of Ancient Maya Skeletons, edited by S.L. Whittington and D.M. Reed, Washington, DC: Smithsonian Institution Press.
Merriwether DA, Hall W, Vahlne A, and Ferrell RE. (1996). mtDNA Variation Indicates Mongolia May Have Been the Source for the Founding Population for the New World. Am J Hum Gen, 59: 204-212.
Merriwether DA, and Ferrell RE. (1996). The Four Founding Lineage Hypothesis: A Critical Re-evaluation. Molecular Phylogenetics and Evolution 5: 241-246.
Merriwether DA, Rothhammer F, and Ferrell RE. (1995). Distribution of the Four- Founding Lineage Haplotypes in Native Americans Suggests a Single Wave of Migration for the New World. Am J Phys Anthropol 98(4): 411-430.
Merriwether DA, Rothhammer F, and Ferrell RE. (1994). Genetic Variation in the New World: Ancient Teeth, Bone, and Tissue as Sources of DNA. Experientia 50: 592-601.
Merriwether DA, Clark AG, Ballinger SW, Schurr TG, Soodyall H, Jenkins T, Sherry ST and Wallace DC. (1991) The Structure of Human Mitochondrial DNA Variation. Journal of Molecular Evolution 33: 543-555.