Polynesians and Native Americans met 800 years ago after epic voyage

Beginning about 5000 years ago, people sailed east from South-East Asia into the Pacific, and found hundreds of islands including Samoa and the Marquesas.

Geneticists have found evidence of Native American genes in Polynesian people, but the results are disputed.

Now Ioannidis and his colleagues have sequenced the full genomes of 354 Polynesian people from 17 islands, as well as 453 Native Americans from 15 groups from the Pacific coast

They found small amounts of Native American DNA in Polynesians from the eastern islands: not just Rapa Nui, but also the Palliser islands, the Marquesas and Mangareva

Did Polynesians sail east to South America and back, or did Native Americans stray west