POPULATION DATA Genetic variation of 17 X-chromosome STR loci in Tunisian population of Nabeul Monia Messoussi 1 & Endika Prieto-Fernández 2 & Miriam Baeta 2 & Carolina Núñez 2 & Amel Ben Ammar-El Gaaied 1 & Marian M. de Pancorbo 2 & Karima Fadhlaoui-Zid 1 Received: 13 November 2017 /Accepted: 13 March 2018 # Springer-Verlag GmbH Germany, part of Springer Nature 2018 Abstract In the present study, the genetic variations of 17 X-STR markers (DXS8378, DXS9898, DXS7133, GATA31E08, GATA172D05, DXS6801, DXS7423, DXS6809, DXS6799, DXS7132, DXS9902, DXS6800, DXS6789, DXS10075, DXS10079, DXS6807, and DXS6803) were analyzed in 139 unrelated individuals in Nabeul, aiming to perform an X-STR database for anthropological and forensic purposes. Our results indicate that DXS6809 was the most polymorphic locus, whereas DXS6807 was the least informative marker. In addition, the obtained values for the statistical parameters of forensic interest, i.e., the power of discrimination in males (PD M ) and females (PD F ), as well as the mean exclusion chance in duos (MEC D ) and trios (MEC T ) have demonstrated that this panel of 17 X-STRs is highly informative and useful for forensic application and anthro- pological research. Additionally, pairwise genetic distances based on F ST were calculated between Nabeul population and other populations extracted from the literature. Genetic distances were represented in a non-metric MDS plot and clustering of populations according to their geographic locations and their historical relationship was detected. Keywords Nabeul city . Tunisia . X-chromosome database . Short tandem repeat . Forensic application Nabeul is a coastal city located in the northeastern region of Tunisia, concretely in the known BCap-Bon^ Peninsula. This city, which was described in the fifth century BCE as the oldest African town after Utique and Carthage, was founded by the Phoenicians [1]. This might explain its Greek name Neapolis that means New City [2]. Nabeul played an impor- tant role during the First Punic War. However, it was destroyed together with Carthage in the Third Punic War (148 BCE), when the BCap-Bon^ region was annexed by Rome [3]. Since 1492, this region has suffered immigration flows of BAndalusians^ and Jews. Because of its complex history, Nabeul is an ancient cosmopolitan town of Tunisia that has been continuously populated since its establishment by the Phoenicians. The successive immigration events Electronic supplementary material The online version of this article (https://doi.org/10.1007/s00414-018-1827-3) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users. * Karima Fadhlaoui-Zid karimafadhlaoui89@gmail.com; karima.fadhlaoui@fst.rnu.tn Monia Messoussi messoussi.monia@gmail.com Endika Prieto-Fernández endikaprietofernandez@gmail.com Miriam Baeta mbaetab@gmail.com Carolina Núñez cnunezdo@gmail.com Amel Ben Ammar-El Gaaied amel.benammarelgaaied@gmail.com Marian M. de Pancorbo marian.mdepancorbo@ehu.eus 1 Laboratory of Genetics, Immunology, and Human Pathologies, Faculty of Science of Tunis, University Tunis El Manar, Tunis, Tunisia 2 BIOMICs Research Group, Lascaray Research Center, University of the Basque Country UPV/EHU, Avda, Miguel de Unamuno, 3, 01006 Vitoria-Gasteiz, Spain International Journal of Legal Medicine https://doi.org/10.1007/s00414-018-1827-3