Microsatellites are molecular clocks that support accurate inferences about history.

Abstract excerpt

Microsatellite length mutations are often modeled using the generalized stepwise mutation process, which is a type of random walk. If this model is sufficiently accurate, one can estimate the coalescence time between alleles of a locus after a mathematical transformation of the allele lengths. When large-scale microsatellite genotyping first became possible, there was substantial interest in using this approach...

Topics

• Animals
• Base Sequence
• Evolution, Molecular
• Gene Frequency
• Genetic Variation
• History, Ancient
• Humans
• Microsatellite Repeats
• Pan troglodytes
• Polymorphism, Single Nucleotide
• Time Factors