Selective sweep with significant positive selection serves as the driving force for the differentiation of japonica and indica rice cultivars.

This research promoted a new possible model of the origin of the cultivated rice that DR-Is in japonica and indica maybe independently originated from the divergent wild rice in the Indo-China Peninsula to southern China, and then followed by frequent introgression. Genes with significant positive selection and biased functions were also detected which could play important roles in rice domestication and differentiation processes.