Island Southeast Asia and Oceania host one of the world’s richest assemblages of human phenotypic, linguistic and cultural diversity. We compiled ~9.7 Mb of Y chromosome sequence from a diverse sample of over 380 men from this region, including 126 from Indonesian islands, first reported here. The granularity of this dataset allows us to fully resolve and date the regional Y chromosome phylogeny. This improved Y chromosome topology highlights localized events with important historical implications, including pre-Holocene contact between Mainland and Island Southeast Asia, ongoing interactions between Australia and the Papuan world, and a sustained period of diversification following the flooding of the ancient Sunda and Sahul continents as the insular landscape of today formed. The high-resolution phylogeny of the Y chromosome presented here thus enables a detailed exploration of past isolation, interaction and change in one of the world’s least understood regions.

Island Southeast Asia and Oceania host one of the world’s richest assemblages of human phenotypic, linguistic and cultural diversity. We compiled ~9.7 Mb of Y chromosome sequence from a diverse sample of over 380 men from this region, including 126 from Indonesian islands, first reported here. The granularity of this dataset allows us to fully resolve and date the regional Y chromosome phylogeny. This improved Y chromosome topology highlights localized events with important historical implications, including pre-Holocene contact between Mainland and Island Southeast Asia, ongoing interactions between Australia and the Papuan world, and a sustained period of diversification following the flooding of the ancient Sunda and Sahul continents as the insular landscape of today formed. The high-resolution phylogeny of the Y chromosome presented here thus enables a detailed exploration of past isolation, interaction and change in one of the world’s least understood regions.

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