The East European (Russian) Plain is a region in which peoples of the Indo-European and Uralic language families have come into contact over an extended period. Uralic-speaking peoples have the longest validated archaeological record in this region [17]. The most recent large-scale migration to this region involved the movement of Slavs (the Indo-European language family) to the east and northeast of their presumed homeland in Central Europe about 500 AD [18,19]. Slavs were not the first Indo-European-speaking people who arrived in the Russian Plain: in the firstmillennium BC, Baltic-speaking tribes occupied a large part of the East European Plain [17]. They were later displaced by Slavic tribes. According to the widely accepted hybridization theory of the origin of Eastern Slavs [20], Slavic populations arriving in the East European Plain were mixed with indigenous Uralic- and, probably, Baltic-speaking people.
...
Populations in the northwestern (Byelorussians 2 from Mjadel’), northern (Russians from Mezen’ and 6 from Oshevensk; Komi 3), and eastern parts (Russians 4 from Puchezh and Chuvash) of the East European Plain have relatively high frequencies of haplotype B2-D2-A2, which may reflect admixture with Uralic-speaking populations.Uralic genetic substratum in these regions, which were inhabited by Uralic-speaking tribes as late as the Early Middle Ages, was also shown by studies in which other genetic markers were used (mtDNA, Y-chromosome, and autosomal). Thus, the analysis of DRD2 haplotypes supports results on Slavic-Uralic admixture obtained using other markers, mainly neutral and sex-specific markers.BMC Genet. 2009 Sep 30;10(1):62. [Epub ahead of print]
Haplotype frequencies at the DRD2 locus in populations of the East European Plain.
Flegontova OV, Khrunin AV, Lylova OI, Tarskaia LA, Spitsyn VA, Mikulich AI, Limborska SA.
ABSTRACT: BACKGROUND: It was demonstrated previously that the three-locus RFLP haplotype, TaqI B-TaqI D-TaqI A (B-D-A), at the DRD2 locus constitutes a powerful genetic marker and probably reflects the most ancient dispersal of anatomically modern humans. RESULTS: We investigated TaqI B, BclI, MboI, TaqI D, and TaqI A RFLPs in 17 contemporary populations of the East European Plain and Siberia. Most of these populations belong to the Indo-European or Uralic language families. We identified three common haplotypes, which occurred in more than 90% of chromosomes investigated. The frequencies of the haplotypes differed according to linguistic and geographical affiliation. CONCLUSIONS: Populations in the northwestern (Byelorussians from Mjadel'), northern (Russians from Mezen' and Oshevensk), and eastern (Russians from Puchezh) parts of the East European Plain had relatively high frequencies of haplotype B2-D2-A2, which may reflect admixture with Uralic-speaking populations that inhabited all of these regions in the Early Middle Ages.