We screened 2.5 million SNPs in 161 individuals from 13 Sahelian populations from Western, Central and Eastern parts of the belt, and including both nomadic and sedentary groups

We confirmed the role of the Sahel belt as a main corridor for human migrations across the African continent. Strong admixture was observed in both Central and Eastern Sahelian populations, with North Africans and Near Eastern/Arabians respectively, but it was inexistent in Western Sahelian populations. Genome-wide local ancestry inference in admixed Sahelian populations revealed several candidate regions that were significantly enriched for non-autochthonous haplotypes, and many showed to be under positive selection.EGA study EGAS00001001610