"Cuicuilco", "Monte Albán" and "Cholula" populations followed an overall "Sundadont" dental pattern "characteristic of Southeast Asia" rather than a "Sinodont" dental pattern "characteristic of Northeast Asia". Sinodont Turner found the Sinodont pattern in the Han Chinese, in the inhabitants of Mongolia and eastern Siberia, in the Native Americans, and in the Yayoi people of Japan. Sinodonty is a particular pattern of teeth characterized by the following features: The upper first incisors and upper second incisors are shovel-shaped, and they are "not aligned with the other teeth". The upper first premolar has one root, and the lower first molar in Sinodonts has three roots (3RM1). Associated traits The EDAR gene causes the Sinodont tooth pattern, and also affects hair texture, jaw morphology, and perhaps the nutritional profile of breast milk. Applicability In the 1990s, Turner's dental morphological traits were frequently mentioned as one of three new tools for studying origins and migrations of human populations. The other two were linguistic methods such as Joseph Greenberg's mass comparison of vocabulary or Johanna Nichols's statistical study of language typology and its evolution, and genetic studies pioneered by Cavalli-Sforza. Today, the largest number of references to Turner's work are from discussions of the origin of Paleo-Amerindians and modern Native Americans, including the Kennewick Man controversy. Turner found that the dental remains of both ancient and modern Amerindians are more similar to each other than they are to dental complexes from other continents, but that the Sinodont patterns of the Paleo-Amerindians identify their ancestral homeland as north-east Asia. Some later studies[which?] have questioned this and found Sundadont features in some American peoples. A study done by Stojonowski et al in 2015 found a "significant interobserver error" in the earlier studies and their statistical analysis of matched wear and morphology scores suggests trait downgrading for some traits. See also Ainu people Australo-Melanesians Austronesian peoples Malay race Odontometrics Shovel-shaped incisors References External links Affinities of the Paleoindians "Tracing Native American Origins" Teeth Biological anthropology