Editing Xiongnu (section)

=== Maternal lineages ===
[[File:Uniparental Haplogroup Assignments by Group and Sex-Bias Z Scores on Xiongnu.png|thumb|right|Uniparental haplogroup assignments by group and sex-bias "z" scores of Xiongnu.<ref name="Choongwon"/>]]
A 2003 study found that 89% of Xiongnu maternal lineages are of East Asian origin, while 11% were of West Eurasian origin. However, a 2016 study found that 37.5% of Xiongnu maternal lineages were West Eurasian, in a central Mongolian sample.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Lee |first1=Joo-Yup |last2=Kuang |first2=Shuntu |title=A Comparative Analysis of Chinese Historical Sources and Y-DNA Studies with Regard to the Early and Medieval Turkic Peoples |journal=Inner Asia |date=2017 |volume=19 |issue=2 |pages=197–239 |doi=10.1163/22105018-12340089 |s2cid=165623743 |url=https://brill.com/view/journals/inas/19/2/article-p197_197.xml |issn=1464-8172 |doi-access=free}} "Analysis of the mitochondrial DNA, which is maternally inherited, shows that the Xiongnu remains from this Egyin Gol necropolis consist mainly of Asian lineages (89%). West Eurasian lineages makeup the rest (11%) (Keyser-Tracqui et al. (2003: 258). However, according to a more recent study of ancient human remains from central Mongolia, the Xiongnu population in cen- tral Mongolia possessed a higher frequency of western mitochondrial DNA haplotypes (37.5%) than the Xiongnu from the Egyin Gol necropolis (Rogers 2016: 78)."</ref>

According to Rogers & Kaestle (2022), these studies make clear that the Xiongnu population is extremely similar to the preceding [[Slab Grave culture|Slab Grave]] population, which had a similar frequency of Eastern and Western maternal haplogroups, supporting a hypothesis of continuity from the Slab Grave period to the Xiongnu. They wrote that the bulk of the genetics research indicates that roughly 27% of Xiongnu maternal haplogroups were of West Eurasian origin, while the rest were East Asian.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Rogers |first1=Leland Liu |last2=Kaestle |first2=Frederika Ann |title=Analysis of mitochondrial DNA haplogroup frequencies in the population of the slab burial mortuary culture of Mongolia (ca. 1100–300 BCE ) |journal=American Journal of Biological Anthropology |date=2022 |volume=177 |issue=4 |pages=644–657 |doi=10.1002/ajpa.24478 |s2cid=246508594 |language=en |issn=2692-7691|doi-access=free }} " The first pattern is that the slab burial mtDNA frequencies are extremely similar to those of the aggregated Xiongnu populations and relatively similar to those of the various Bronze Age Mongolian populations, strongly supporting a population continuity hypothesis for the region over these time periods (Honeychurch, 2013)"</ref>

Some examples of maternal haplogroups observed in Xiongnu specimens include [[Haplogroup D (mtDNA)#D4|D4b2b4]], [[Haplogroup N (mtDNA)|N9a2a]], [[Haplogroup G (mtDNA)|G3a3]], [[Haplogroup D (mtDNA)#D4|D4a6]] and [[Haplogroup D (mtDNA)#D4|D4b2b2b]].{{sfn|Damgaard et al.|2018 |loc=Supplementary Table 8, Rows 87-88, 94-96}} and [[Haplogroup U (mtDNA)#Haplogroup U2|U2e1]].<ref>{{harvnb|Kim et al.|2010|p=429}}</ref>