Patterns of single nucleotide polymorphism distribution in hypervariable regions of the D-loop of human mitochondrial DNA

The D4oop of mtDNA is a noncoding locus actively used as an individualizing marker in molecular genetic research. Uneven distribution of SNPs in the D-loop suggests that the functional load within this region is irregular. The nucleotide sequence analysis was used to evaluate the structural and functional role of various D-loop sites of a single individual’s mtDNA an d their importance in terms of phylogenetic conservatism. The role of duplication of various D-loop elements (TAS, ETAS, CSB elements) in increasing the reliability of the mtDNA replication initiation and termination is discussed.