Population genetic analysis of the GlobalFiler STR loci in 748 individuals from the Kazakh population of Xinjiang in northwest China.

The six-dye GlobalFiler™ Express PCR amplification kit incorporates 21 commonly used autosomal short tandem repeat (STR) loci and three gender determination loci. In this study, we analyzed the GlobalFiler STR loci on 748 unrelated individuals from a Chinese Kazakh population of Xinjiang, China. No significant deviations from Hardy-Weinberg equilibrium and linkage disequilibrium were observed within and between 21 autosomal STR loci. SE33 showed the greatest power of discrimination in Kazakh population. The combined power of discrimination of Kazakh was 99.999999999999999999999996797 %. No significant differences of allele frequencies were observed between Kazakh and Uyghur at all 15 tested STR loci, as well as Mongolian. Significant differences were only observed between Kazakh and the other Chinese populations at TH01. Multiple STR loci showed significant differences between Kazakh and Arab, as well as South Portuguese. The multidimensional scaling plot (MDS) plot and neighbor-joining tree also showed Kazakh is genetically close to Uyghur.