The Alu family developed through successive waves of fixation closely connected with primate lineage history.

A new method of analyzing phylogenetic relations among members of the sequence family is presented and applied to human Alu sequences upon which work has been published. This method, based upon a correspondence analysis, works with large samples and yields easily interpretable graphical representations. Results obtained argue in favor of a new evolutionary scheme for Alu sequences, implying successive waves of amplification/fixation closely connected to primate lineage history.