Cristian Capelli

RCUK Research Fellow

My research focuses on human evolution, with a particular attention to the processes that have shaped the distribution of genetic variation across human populations. Current projects address the historical events that led to the peopling of the Mediterranean region and the European continent and the investigation of genetic variation across linguistic boundaries. As part of ongoing collaborations, new research is being directed towards the investigation of population diversity in Sub-Sahara Africa.

2006-present	RCUK Academic Fellow in Human Evolution College Tutor	Department of Zoology University of Oxford St Hugh's College
2004-2006	Technical Services Scientist	Promega Italia
2003-2004	Research Assistant Institute of Legal Medicine	Università Cattolica del S. Cuore, Rome, Italy
2002-2003	Field Sales Representative	Abbott Pharmaceuticals, Campoverde, Latina, Italy
2001-2002	Research Assistant Institute of Legal Medicine	Università Cattolica del S. Cuore, Rome, Italy
2000-2001	Research Assistant Evolutionary Genetics	Galton Laboratory UCL, UK
2000	Visiting Student (Prof David B Goldstein)	Galton Laboratory UCL, UK
1998	Visiting Student (Prof Svante Paabo)	Institute of Zoology University of Munich Germany

Education

1996-2000	PhD Forensic Genetics Institute of Legal Medicine	Università Cattolica del S. Cuore, Rome, Italy
1991-1996	Degree in Molecular Biology (cum lauda)	University of Rome "La Sapienza", Italy

Teaching

Supervision of two graduate students (George Busby and Sarah Marks), University of Oxford.

Lectures on Human Evolution and Forensic Genetics within the Human Sciences course, University of Oxford.
Supervision of graduate and undergraduate students at the Institute of Legal Medicine, Forensic Genetics, Università Cattolica del S. Cuore, Rome, Italy.

Outreach

Contribution to the Life Science Encyclopedia (“Genetics and the Origins of the British Population”); Local newspaper interviews; Radio interviews on research results and commentaries. As part of my contribution to the scientific community, I have reviewed papers submitted to various scientific journals (American Journal of Human Genetics, Molecular Biology and Evolution, Human Genetics, Annals of Human Genetics; Forensic Science International Genetics, etc) and I have evaluated grant proposals submitted to the BBSRC and the Ministry of Science of Estonia. Since 2008 I have been invited to become Associated Editor of the Journal of Anthropological Sciences (JAS).

Publications

Coia V, Brisighelli F, Donati F, Pascali V, Boschi I, Luiselli D, Battaggia C, Batini C, Taglioli L, Cruciani F, Paoli G, Capelli C, Spedini G, Destro-Bisol G. (2009) A multi-perspective view of genetic variation in Cameroon. Am J Phys Anthropol. (Accepted)

Tofanelli S, Ferri G, Caciagli L, Onofri V, Taglioli L, Bulayeva K, Bulayev O, Boschi I, Alù M, Berti A, Barni F, Rapone C, Beduschi G, Luiselli D, Cadenas AM, Awadelkarim KD, Mariani-Costantini R, Elwali NE, Verginelli F, Herrera RJ, Gusmão L, Paoli G, Capelli C (2009) J1-M267 Y lineage marks climate-driven pre-historical human displacements. Eur J Hum Genet. (Accepted)>

Capelli C, Onofri V, Brisighelli F, Boschi I, Scarnicci F, Masullo M, Ferri G, Tofanelli S, Tagliabracci A, Gusmao L, Amorim A, Gatto F, Kirin M, Merlitti D, Brion M, Verea AB, Romano V, Cali F, Pascali V. (2009)

Moors and Saracens in Europe: estimating the medieval North African male legacy in southern Europe. Eur J Hum Genet. 17(6):848-52.

Anagnostou P, Battaggia C, Coia V, Capelli C, Fabbri C, Pettener D,Destro-Bisol G, Luiselli D. (2009) Tracing the Distribution and Evolution of Lactase Persistence in Southern Europe Through the Study of the T-13910 Variant. Am J Hum Biol. 21(2):217-9.

Brisighelli F, Capelli C, Álvarez-Iglesias V, Onofri V, Paoli G, Tofanelli S, Carracedo A, Pascali VL, Salas A. (2009) The Etruscan timeline: a recent Anatolian connection Eur J Hum Genet. 17(5):693-6.

Brisighelli F, Capelli C, Boschi I, Garagnani P, Lareua MV, Pascali VL , Carracedo A. (2009) Allele frequencies of fifteen STRs in a representative sample of the Italian population Forensic Sci Int Genet. 3(2):e29-30.

Price AL, Butler J, Patterson N, Capelli C, Pascali VL, Scarnicci F, Ruiz-Linares A, Groop L, Saetta AA, Korkolopoulou P, Seligsohn U, Waliszewska A, Schirmer C, Ardlie K, Ramos A, Nemesh J, Arbeitman L, Goldstein DB, Reich D, Hirschhorn JN. (2008) Discerning the ancestry of European Americans in genetic association studies. PLoS Genet. 4(1):e236.

Capelli C, Brisighelli F, Scarnicci F, Brion M, VL Pascali. (2007) Phylogenetic evidence for multiple DYS19 locus duplication events. Forensic Science International: Genetics 1 (3-4): 287-290

Caramelli D, Lalueza-Fox C., Capelli C., Laria M., Sampietro ML, Elena Milani GL, Pilli E, Guimaraes S, Chiarelli B, Terribile Wien Marin V, Casoli A, Stanyon R, Bertranpetit J, Barbujani G. (2007) Genetic analysis of the skeletal remains attributed to Francesco Petrarca Forensic Sci Int. 173(1):36-40.

Capelli C, Brisighelli F, Scarnicci F, Arredi B, Caglia’ A, Vetrugno G, Onofri V, Tofanelli S, Paoli G, Pascali VL (2007) Y chromosome genetic variation in the Italian peninsula is clinal and supports an admixture model for the Mesolithic-Neolithic encounter. Mol Phylogenet Evol. 44:228-239

Rapone C, Geraci A, Capelli C, De Meo A, Derrico G, Barni F, Berti A, Lago G (2007) Y chromosome haplotypes in Central-South Italy: implication for reference database Forensic Sci Int. 172(1):67-71

Capelli C, MacPhee RDE, Roca AL, Brisighelli F, Georgiadis N, O'Brien SJ, Greenwood AD (2006) A nuclear DNA phylogeny of the woolly mammoth (Mammuthus primigenius) Molecular Phylogenetics and Evolution. 40:620-7 (First three authors contributed equally to this work)

Capelli C, Arredi B, Baldassari L, Boschi I, Brisighelli F, Caglia A, Dobosz M, Scarnicci F, Vetrugno G, Pascali VL. (2006) A 9-loci Y chromosome haplotype in three Italian populations. Forensic Science International 159 64-70

Capelli C, Redhead N, Romano V, Cali F, Lefranc G, V. Delague V, Megarbane A, Felice AE, Pascali VL , Neophytou PI, Polli Z, A. Novelletto A, Malaspina P, Terrenato L, Berebbi A, Fellous M, Thomas MG, Goldstein DB. (2006) Population Structure in the Mediterranean Basin: A Y Chromosome Perspective Ann Hum Genet 70(2): 207-225.

Capelli C. (2005) Measuring bones and sequencing DNA: not that far as thought. Journal of Anthropological Sciences 83:139-140

Verginelli F, Capelli C, Coia V, Musiani M, Falchetti M, Ottini L, Palmirotta R, Tagliacozzo A, De Grossi Mazzorin I, Mariani-Costantini R. (2005) Mitochondrial DNA from Prehistoric Canids Highlights Relationships Between Dogs and South-East European Wolves. Mol Biol Evol. 22(12):2541-2551.

Destro-Bisol G, Donati F, Coia V, Boschi I, Verginelli F, Caglia A, Tofanelli S, Spedini G, Capelli C. (2004) Variation of female and male lineages in sub-Saharan populations: the importance of sociocultural factors. Mol Biol Evol. 21(9):1673-82.

Tully G, Barritt SM, Bender K, Brignon E, Capelli C, Dimo-Simonin N, Eichmann C, Ernst CM, Lambert C, Lareu MV, Ludes B, Mevag B, Parson W, Pfeiffer H, Salas A, Schneider PM, Staalstrom E. (2004) Results of a collaborative study of the EDNAP group regarding mitochondrial DNA heteroplasmy and segregation in hair shafts. Forensic Sci Int. 140(1):1-11.

Capelli C, Redhead N, Abernethy JK, Gratrix F, Wilson JF,Moen, T Hervig T,Richards M, Stumpf MPH,. Underhill PA,Bradshaw P, Shaha A, . Thomas MG, Bradman N, Goldstein DB. (2003) A Y Chromosome Census of the British Isles. Current Biology, 13, 979–984

Capelli C, Tschentscher F, Pascali VL. (2003) "Ancient" protocols for the crime scene?. Similarities and differences between forensic genetics and ancient DNA analysis. Forensic Sci Int. 9;131(1):59-64.

Hofreiter M, Capelli C, Krings M, Waits L, Conard N, Munzel S, Rabeder G, Nagel D, Paunovic M, Jambresic G, Meyer S, Weiss G, Paabo S. (2002) Ancient DNA analyses reveal high mitochondrial DNA sequence diversity and parallel morphological evolution of late pleistocene cave bears. Mol Biol Evol. 19(8):1244-50.

Thomas MG, Weale ME, Jones AL,Richards M, Smith A, Redhead N, Torroni A, Scozzari R, Gratrix F, Tarekegn A, Wilson JF, Capelli C, Neil Bradman N, Goldstein DB. (2002) Founding Mothers of Jewish Communities: Geographically Separated Jewish Groups Were Independently Founded by Very Few Female Ancestors. Am. J. Hum. Genet. 70:1411–1420

Carracedo A, Beckmann A, Bengs A, Brinkmann B, Caglia A, Capelli C, Gill P, Gusmao L, Hagelberg C, Hohoff C, Hoste B, Kihlgren A, Kloosterman A, Myhre Dupuy B, Morling N, O'Donnell G, Parson W, Phillips C, Pouwels M, Scheithauer R, Schmitter H, Schneider PM, Schumm J, Skitsa I, Stradmann-Bellinghausen B, Stuart M, Syndercombe Court D, Vide C. (2001) Results of a collaborative study of the EDNAP group regarding the reproducibility and robustness of the Y-chromosome STRs DYS19, DYS389 I and II, DYS390 and DYS393 in a PCR pentaplex format. Forensic Sci Int. 119(1):28-41.

Greenwood AD, Lee F, Capelli C, DeSalle R, Tikhonov A, Marx PA, MacPhee RD. (2001) Evolution of Endogenous Retrovirus-like Elements of the Woolly Mammoth (Mammuthus primigenius) and its Relatives. Mol Biol Evol 18(5):840-847

Capelli C, Wilson JF, Richards M, Stumpf MP, Gratrix F, Oppenheimer S,Underhill P, Pascali VL, Ko TM, Goldstein DB. (2001) A predominantly indigenous paternal heritage for the Austronesian-speaking peoples of insular Southeast Asia and Oceania. Am J Hum Genet. 68(2):432-43.

Maviglia R, Dobosz M, Boschi I, Caglia A, Hall D, Capelli C, d'Aloja E, Pescarmona M, Moscetti A, Pascali VL, Destro-Bisol G. (2001) A repository of 14 PCR-loci italian gene frequencies in the world wide web. Forensic Sci Int. 115(1-2):99-101.

Krings M, Capelli C, Tschentscher F, Geisert H, Meyer S, von Haeseler A, Grossschmidt K, Possnert G, Paunovic M, Paabo S. (2000) A view of neandertal genetic diversity. Nat Genet.26(2):144-6 (First three authors contributed equally to this work)

    Destro-Bisol G, Capelli C, Belledi M. (2000) Inferring microevolutionary patterns from allele-size frequency distributions of minisatellite loci: a worldwide study of the APOB 3' hypervariable region polymorphism. Hum Biol. 72(5):733-51.

    Destro-Bisol G, Belledi M, Capelli C, Maviglia R, Spedini G. (2000)
Genetic variation at the ApoB 3' HVR minisatellite locus in the Mbenzele Pygmies from theCentral African Republic. Am J Human Biol. 12(5):588-592.

Greenwood AD, Capelli C, Possnert G, Paabo S (1999) Nuclear DNA sequences from late Pleistocene Megafauna Mol Biol Evo 16(11):1466-73

book chapters

Krings M, Capelli C, Tschentscher F. Human Evolution: Clues from Neanderthal mtDNA control region sequences-What’s next? In Schmitz EW (Ed). Neanderthal 1856-2006. Verlag Phillip Von Zabern, Mainz Am Rheim (Germany) pp321-328 (2006)

Tofanelli S., Capelli C., Taglioli L., Paoli G. Signatures on the Y chromosome of the demographic history of Elba island (Northern Mediterranean). (2006) In: Calò C. and Vona G. (Eds.) Human Genetic Isolates. Research Signpost, Keral (India). pp.71-85

Capelli C, Tschentscher F. Protocols for ancient DNA typing. Methods Mol Biol. 297:265-78 (2005)

Tschentscher F, Capelli C, Geisert H, Krainitzki H, Schmitz RW, Krings M. Mitochondrial DNA sequences from the Neanderthals. In: Orschiedt J, Weniger GC (Hg.), Neanderthals and Modern Humans - Discussing the Transition S.303-314. Wissenschaftliche Schriften des Neanderthal Museums, Mettmann, (2000)