Mitochondrial Eve: a de facto deception?

The above image, and the one to the left, are screenshots from my father's 23andMe profile. Interestingly, his mtDNA haplogroup is not particularly common among ethnic Bengalis, who are more than ~80% on a branch of M. This reality is clear in the map above which illustrates the Central Asian distribution my father's mtDNA lineage. In contrast, his whole genome is predominantly South Asianform, as is evident in the estimate that 23andMe provided via their ancestry composition feature, which utilizes the broader genome. The key takeaway here is that the mtDNA is informative, but it should not be considered to be representative, or anything like the last word on one's ancestry in this day and age. As a matter of historical record mtDNA looms large in human population genetics and phylogeography for understandable reasons. Mitchondria produce more genetic material than is found in the nucleus, and so were the lowest ...