Reply to Macaulay et al. (1999): mitochondrial DNA recombination - reasonsto panic

We recently presented evidence of recombination in human mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) using a data set of largely complete human mtDNAs gleaned from GenB ank and the literature. It was pointed out that some of the sequences are p robably incorrect and that, when those sequences are removed, so too is the evidence of recombination. Nevertheless, we argue that there is still evid ence of recombination. First, there are excessive numbers of homoplasies in other mtDNA data sets. Second, an expanded data set of our own, excluding the sequences which are the subject of suspicion, shows a significant exces s of homoplasies and, hence, evidence of recombination.