Kevin Brook, who occasionally comments on this blog, has published a peer-reviewed book titled The Maternal Genetic Lineages of Ashkenazic Jews.
The book focuses on 129 mitochondrial (mtDNA) haplogroups that are found in present-day Ashkenazic Jews, and reveals that these lineages can be traced back to a wide range of places, such as Israel, Italy, Poland, Germany, North Africa, and China.
Ergo, it argues that both Israelites and converts to Judaism from a variety of gentile groups made lasting contributions to the Ashkenazic maternal gene pool. In Kevin's own words, the book also:
- shows that all Ashkenazim remain genetically linked to a significant degree to other types of Jewish populations, not only paternally but maternally as well
- disproves the myth that Cossack rapists were responsible for any of the non-Israelite DNA in Ashkenazim
- presents new DNA evidence in favor of a small contribution of Khazarian and Alan converts to Judaism to the Ashkenazic gene pool.
That makes good sense based on what I've learned over the years from studying modern and ancient genome-wide Ashkenazic DNA. More information about Kevin's book is available at the Khazaria.com website HERE.
See also...
My take on the Erfurt Jews
