DNA study reveals Native Hawaiians are descended from Easter Island sailors who crossed 4,350 miles of open Pacific

A Stanford Medicine-led study published in the journal Science has traced Native Hawaiians' origins to ancient seafarers who departed Easter Island — Rapa Nui in the native tongue — around the 1200s and crossed roughly 7,000 kilometres of open Pacific to reach Hawaii. Using whole-genome sequencing drawn from more than 1,000 Polynesians, researchers established that Hawaii and Rapa Nui share the strongest genetic ties of any Polynesian island pair, appearing together in 61% of 2,500 reconstructed family trees. Co-senior author Keolu Fox, himself a Native Hawaiian, was so startled by the result that he verified it four separate ways before accepting it.

Researchers have identified Mangareva in French Polynesia as the ancestral staging post from which the ancient sailors most likely departed, linking it to the founding populations of both Hawaii and Rapa Nui.

The repeated small-group migrations created founder effects at least 10 times stronger than those recorded among Finns, which has amplified rare genetic variants associated with inherited disease in modern Native Hawaiians.

The research designates the voyaging population 'holomoana nui' — Hawaiian for 'great ocean voyaging' — and concludes that the findings carry 'profound implications' for precision medicine and genetic screening among Polynesian communities.