Conclusion
All analyses concluded that sub-Saharan African individuals are ancestral and genetically distinct from all other non-African individuals. Sub-Saharan samples also had the highest heterozygosity mirroring its host. Unlike the mitochondrial clades, nuclear genetic clusters of lice are highly structured based on geography (continental and major regions within continents). This mito-nuclear incongruence is possibly due to different evolutionary histories of the markers.
Although we do not know the exact timing of this genetic population structure that we observed, it seems possible that these five nuclear genetic clusters are a result of more recent events of human migration (e.g European colonization) and settlement across the world (Ascunce 2013) or it is reflective of major historical events in the human history such as anatomically modern humans moving out of Africa. Further investigations on the timing of these nuclear population splits and coalescent based approaches to investigate the most recent common ancestor are needed to confirm the host influence on shaping the genetic structure of this parasite.