Sixteen of the twenty-nine examined subsets contain data that can be used for population genetic analysis. We will deal with these analyses in the future. Additionally, we present a method to calculate the minimum number of individuals required for reliable haplotype frequency estimation. We analyzed the HLAA, B, C, DR and DQ phenotypes of 2,440 healthy, unrelated, Dutch Caucasoid blood donors and of 20,814 Dutch blood donors who were registered as volunteer bone marrow or platelet donors. The population appears to be in Hardy-Weinberg equilibrium.
Many haplotypes are in strong positive linkage disequilibrium.
A phylogenetic tree, based on the HLAA, B and DR gene frequencies of blood donors in different Dutch regions, reflects the limited but manifest heterogeneity of the Dutch population. In order to calculate reliable HLA gene and haplotype frequencies of bone marrow donors in various regions in the world, we have analyzed the HLAA, B and DR phenotype frequencies of eighteen bone marrow donor registries with a total of more than 300,000 HLAA, B typed donors. These registries were included in the 22nd edition of Bone Marrow Donors Worldwide. Remarkable gene and haplotype frequency differences exist between the registries. The genetic distances between the different registries were used to draw phylogenetic trees that clearly show that the degree of similarity between registries is related to their geographic locations.