Genetic Genealogy
Genetic Genealogy
Genealogists now use molecular genealogy, comparing and matching people by matrilineal DNA lineages -- matrilineal mtDNA or patrilineal Y-chromosome ancestry, SNP, and/or autosomal tests. People interested in ancestry now look at genetic markers to trace the migrations of the human species. You can trace your genealogy by DNA from your grandparents back 10,000 or more years.
Anyone can be interested in DNA for ancestry research, learning how different populations from a mosaic of communities reached their current locations. From whom are you descended? What markers shed light on your deepest ancestry? You can study DNA for medical reasons or to discover the geographic travels and dwelling places of some of your ancestors. DNA does not target specific ancestors by name but does reveal rare genetic markers. Specifically, you can interpret your DNA test and/or genealogy for family history.
Particular genetic markers are called ancestry informative markers (AIM). They correlate with populations of specific geographical areas. Autosomal DNA shows the "genetic percentages" of a person's ancestry from particular continents/regions or identify the countries and "tribes" of origin. SNPs are locations on DNA where nucleotides have "mutated" or "switched" to a different nucleotide. Tests listing geographical places of origin use alleles. Individual and family variations on various chromosomes across the genome are analyzed with the aid of population databases.
Initiation opens a communication link between the aspirant and divine guiding principle -- our inner genius -- fostering balance in the personality as the firm foundation for spiritual development. Maat or 'Balance' was the prime expression of the Egyptian Mystery Schools, because it gave order and meaning to life.
In the East, it is called the Tao, a dynamic blending of yin and yang. In Kabbalah, it is the Middle Way. Balance helps us to achieve the goals we want in life and to manifest our dreams. You can easily integrate this wisdom tradition in your own householder life. Empowerment comes through grounding and centering
Such knowledge transforms and activates a new level of Being, internally and in the world, at large. The Grail has come calling and collected its own, informing our sparks of consciousness with a connection to hyperdimensional depth, with a sense of mission and purpose, with a commitment to the recovery of our self-awareness and inherent potential of genius for clarity. This is the Path of Return.
We've had glimpses of a way of being human that embodies rare integrity, freedom, wholeness and beauty--and we dream of the life and world that could result from sustaining that ideal. Most of us are held back from our greater potential by a deep-rooted undertow pulling us down from the heights we could achieve. This persistent barrier to our optimal growth is the ancient, hardwired programming of our evolutionary past, the "software" of our primitive ancestry.
We operate (often unconsciously) from "inherited" instincts, assumptions, and responses that have been encoded into humankind for millennia--vestiges of an ancient animal past.
These unproductive patterns form an invisible ceiling preventing us from reaching our true potential. In fact, this innate and primitive "conditioning" is the key reason that most of our efforts at change fail--whether as individuals or as a society.
The key to breaking this "sound barrier" in consciousness is learning how to awaken and activate a latent spiritual capacity. It lives within each of us, but often remains dormant, just beneath the surface of our awareness. This often hidden dimension of our being is a boundless source of inspiration, passion, creativity and clarity--and when we learn how to tap into it, we rapidly find ourselves on the other side of everything that previously stood in our way.
"Grail Carriers" Today
We have reclaimed our voice on the world stage. We are speaking out, in part, because of the needful state of the world and because whole industries and memes are based on misapprehensions, out-right lies, and exploitation of our ancestral legacy. We are awakened.
We are engaged in a transpersonal, metaphysical method of knowing Truth. Namely, that Necessity binds us to our destiny, which is not to be confused with linear pre-ordination. The Underground Stream honors the Feminine. Cultural Transformation can only come through the cultural evolution toward partnership. We are here to set the record straight and define ourselves with our own narratives in today's world, as the stewards we rightfully claim to be. "Jung found further that the mandala does not only mirror an inner state of order, but that its harmony or disharmony encompasses also the surroundings of the individual. Thus a mandala needs a symbol in which the outer and inner world merge. There is for Jung a ultimate reality beyond matter and psyche which he called the unus mundus, its empirical manifestation is the principle of synchronicity because in synchronistic events the inner world behaves as if it were outside and the outer world as if it were inside. As the mandala symbolism expresses the holistic order of matter and psyche it should have been investigated by physicists as well as psychologists because the mandala reappears in their hypothetical models of the atomic world. The atomic model of Niels Bohr is already a cosmic mandala and the models which the physicists construct nowadays to visualize the quarks are also mandalas." (M-L von Franz)
Imagine for a moment that the fate of the entire human race rested on your shoulders alone. That humanity's evolution out of brute self-interest depended entirely on your willingness to transform your consciousness.
What if you knew that the human race could advance past its smallness and negative conditioning --if you only became an exemplar of humanity's highest potential for the world? Imagine that for you, evolving beyond ego became an evolutionary imperative. Would you approach your path any differently?
Would the energy you bring to your spiritual practice intensify? Would the quality of awareness and care with which you approached your interactions with others become more profound? Would you find yourself reaching with inner muscles you didn't even know you had to actually stay awake to the depth you've tasted in your most profound spiritual moments? If you knew it all rested on you, would you have any choice but to change?
The Indian sage Ramana Maharshi once said that the spiritual aspirant must want liberation like a drowning person wants air. Why? Because the challenges of authentic spiritual growth and transformation are so great that most of us will choose to continue suffering in our smallness, rather than feel the pain of allowing that smallness to die forever.
Modern science has in recent decades been verifying what the ancient traditions intuited long ago: that, in both tangible and mysterious ways, we are all interconnected. Any one of us can have a profound effect on the whole. Add to that the reality that we are evolving beings living in an evolving universe. We are all part of a grand, cosmic evolutionary process. Then the question of our obligation to the whole starts to cut close to the bone.
To reframe the earlier question: What if you realized that the entire human endeavor, the evolution of consciousness itself, depended on your willingness to evolve your own consciousness? How would it affect the choices you make every day if you knew that in a very real sense, those choices were either contributing to the evolution of the whole--or holding it back?
At this time when it seems that our very future depends on our willingness to evolve as a species, would you have any choice but to act in alignment with the greatest evolutionary good? The point is that when we take a closer look at what spiritual work and growth is actually for, it quickly becomes clear that the path of awakening is not primarily about freeing ourselves from suffering or securing our own happiness. Sure, that's a nice by-product. But, as long as that's all we're seeking, we probably won't get very far.
Where the spiritual path really begins to get interesting is when we recognize that transforming ourselves in the deepest possible way is in fact an evolutionary imperative, with profound consequences far beyond ourselves.
If we begin to embrace the fact that our lives are not simply our own to do with as we please--that in everything we do, we are in fact accountable to the Whole--something truly miraculous begins to happen. Faced with the palpable responsibility to evolve for a greater good, we find that we suddenly have access to a seemingly infinite source of energy, intention, passion and courage to confront whatever challenges present themselves on our path.
What's more, all of the personal issues and problems--all of the fears and doubts and resistances that once seemed so insurmountable--begin to seem a lot less significant. Why? Because our attention is now captivated by something much bigger than ourselves. This is the power of context.
We see our individual concerns, the worries we fret over day to day, from a different vantage point. Held up against this larger picture and greater purpose, those concerns suddenly seem very small indeed. Realizing "it's not all about me," and ignited by a noble calling to participate in the grand adventure of conscious evolution, we find we no longer even want to give those worries the time of day.
Where Do We Come From?
By analyzing the genetic variation of modern Europeans, Cavalli-Sforza and Ammerman decided that Europeans are descended largely from populations of farmers who started migrating out of the Middle East 9,000 years ago. As the sons and daughters of farming families left their parents’ farms and moved into new territory, they interbred with the existing hunter-gatherer populations, which produced gradients of genetic change radiating from the Middle East.
Only in mountainous areas unattractive to farmers—the Pyrenees homelands of the Basques, for example—were the genes of the indigenous peoples comparatively intact. Other historical events, too, appeared to have influenced the European gene pool. For example, a genetic trail leads from the area north of the Black and Caspian Seas into the rest of Europe. Cavalli-Sforza linked this trail to the spread of the descendants of nomadic warriors and herders who first domesticated the horse, about 4,000 B.C.
Evidence clearly indicates that sometime in the period 100,000 to 200,000 years ago our ancestors went through a severe genetic bottleneck. Perhaps an environmental change drove ancient people to the brink of extinction. A more likely scenario, however, is that a relatively small group, numbering fewer than 20,000 at times and probably living in eastern Africa, was isolated for many thousands of years from the many groups of archaic human beings scattered throughout Africa, Europe, and Asia.
The people who emerged from this genetic bottleneck had traits never before seen in human beings. They had lighter builds, new ways of interacting among themselves, and perhaps a greater facility with language. Eventually the descendants of these people spread throughout Africa and beyond.
They reached Australia at least 60,000 years ago, probably traveling from the Horn of Africa and then along the South Asia shoreline. They arrived in the Middle East a bit more than 40,000 years ago. By 35,000 years ago anatomically modern people had spread into Europe from the Middle East and into East Asia from Southeast Asia. Sometime more than 12,000 years ago they entered the Americas.
Fewer than 10,000 generations separate everyone alive today from the small group of Africans who are our common ancestors. That’s much more than the twenty or so generations mentioned in Genesis, but it’s the blink of an eye in evolutionary terms. Even over thousands of generations human groups have not differentiated in any substantial way.
Rather, the genetic evidence indicates that modern human beings have expanded as a single, relatively well mixed population without subsequent genetic bottlenecks (bottlenecks tend to erase the evidence of previous bottlenecks, which is how geneticists know that the bottleneck in Africa was the most recent one). Our comparative youth as a species accounts for our extreme genetic homogeneity. The chimpanzees living on a single hillside in Africa have twice as much variety in their DNA as do the six billion people scattered across the globe.
There’s another reason for our biological homogeneity. Modern human beings have never been able to resist for long what Noël Coward called “the urge to merge.” A person traveling due east from Madrid to Beijing (both at about 40°N latitude) would pass Italians, Greeks, Turks, Armenians, Uzbeks, Tajiks, Kyrgyz, Uighurs, Mongolians, and Han Chinese, among others. All these groups resemble their immediate neighbors more than they do groups farther away because of the continual exchange of mates across group boundaries.
There’s a simple way of describing our genetic relatedness. Not only do all people have the same set of genes, but all groups of people also share the major variants of those genes. Geneticists have never found a genetic marker that is of one type in all the members of one large group and of a different type in all the members of another large group. That’s why ethnically targeted biological weapons would never work. Every group overlaps genetically with every other. We have cultural differences masquerading as race problems.
http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2001/04/the-genetic-archaeology-of-race/2180/
There is no singular gene, mutation, allele, STR or SNP that tells the whole story. There are clusters of mutations that show deep relationship patterns of regional origin in some individuals. There is no DNA report that is 100% conclusive. They use the statistical mathematics of the educated guess.
Statistical and sampling flaws can lead to misinterpretations, based on too small of samplings and comparison studies. So, our own conclusions about our own DNA tests are, in part, interpretations of an interpretation. We can only draw inferences about the past based on the patterns observed in human DNA. And this is what keeps our quest alive.
http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2001/04/the-genetic-archaeology-of-race/2180/
Genealogists now use molecular genealogy, comparing and matching people by matrilineal DNA lineages -- matrilineal mtDNA or patrilineal Y-chromosome ancestry, SNP, and/or autosomal tests. People interested in ancestry now look at genetic markers to trace the migrations of the human species. You can trace your genealogy by DNA from your grandparents back 10,000 or more years.
Anyone can be interested in DNA for ancestry research, learning how different populations from a mosaic of communities reached their current locations. From whom are you descended? What markers shed light on your deepest ancestry? You can study DNA for medical reasons or to discover the geographic travels and dwelling places of some of your ancestors. DNA does not target specific ancestors by name but does reveal rare genetic markers. Specifically, you can interpret your DNA test and/or genealogy for family history.
Particular genetic markers are called ancestry informative markers (AIM). They correlate with populations of specific geographical areas. Autosomal DNA shows the "genetic percentages" of a person's ancestry from particular continents/regions or identify the countries and "tribes" of origin. SNPs are locations on DNA where nucleotides have "mutated" or "switched" to a different nucleotide. Tests listing geographical places of origin use alleles. Individual and family variations on various chromosomes across the genome are analyzed with the aid of population databases.
Initiation opens a communication link between the aspirant and divine guiding principle -- our inner genius -- fostering balance in the personality as the firm foundation for spiritual development. Maat or 'Balance' was the prime expression of the Egyptian Mystery Schools, because it gave order and meaning to life.
In the East, it is called the Tao, a dynamic blending of yin and yang. In Kabbalah, it is the Middle Way. Balance helps us to achieve the goals we want in life and to manifest our dreams. You can easily integrate this wisdom tradition in your own householder life. Empowerment comes through grounding and centering
Such knowledge transforms and activates a new level of Being, internally and in the world, at large. The Grail has come calling and collected its own, informing our sparks of consciousness with a connection to hyperdimensional depth, with a sense of mission and purpose, with a commitment to the recovery of our self-awareness and inherent potential of genius for clarity. This is the Path of Return.
We've had glimpses of a way of being human that embodies rare integrity, freedom, wholeness and beauty--and we dream of the life and world that could result from sustaining that ideal. Most of us are held back from our greater potential by a deep-rooted undertow pulling us down from the heights we could achieve. This persistent barrier to our optimal growth is the ancient, hardwired programming of our evolutionary past, the "software" of our primitive ancestry.
We operate (often unconsciously) from "inherited" instincts, assumptions, and responses that have been encoded into humankind for millennia--vestiges of an ancient animal past.
These unproductive patterns form an invisible ceiling preventing us from reaching our true potential. In fact, this innate and primitive "conditioning" is the key reason that most of our efforts at change fail--whether as individuals or as a society.
The key to breaking this "sound barrier" in consciousness is learning how to awaken and activate a latent spiritual capacity. It lives within each of us, but often remains dormant, just beneath the surface of our awareness. This often hidden dimension of our being is a boundless source of inspiration, passion, creativity and clarity--and when we learn how to tap into it, we rapidly find ourselves on the other side of everything that previously stood in our way.
"Grail Carriers" Today
We have reclaimed our voice on the world stage. We are speaking out, in part, because of the needful state of the world and because whole industries and memes are based on misapprehensions, out-right lies, and exploitation of our ancestral legacy. We are awakened.
We are engaged in a transpersonal, metaphysical method of knowing Truth. Namely, that Necessity binds us to our destiny, which is not to be confused with linear pre-ordination. The Underground Stream honors the Feminine. Cultural Transformation can only come through the cultural evolution toward partnership. We are here to set the record straight and define ourselves with our own narratives in today's world, as the stewards we rightfully claim to be. "Jung found further that the mandala does not only mirror an inner state of order, but that its harmony or disharmony encompasses also the surroundings of the individual. Thus a mandala needs a symbol in which the outer and inner world merge. There is for Jung a ultimate reality beyond matter and psyche which he called the unus mundus, its empirical manifestation is the principle of synchronicity because in synchronistic events the inner world behaves as if it were outside and the outer world as if it were inside. As the mandala symbolism expresses the holistic order of matter and psyche it should have been investigated by physicists as well as psychologists because the mandala reappears in their hypothetical models of the atomic world. The atomic model of Niels Bohr is already a cosmic mandala and the models which the physicists construct nowadays to visualize the quarks are also mandalas." (M-L von Franz)
Imagine for a moment that the fate of the entire human race rested on your shoulders alone. That humanity's evolution out of brute self-interest depended entirely on your willingness to transform your consciousness.
What if you knew that the human race could advance past its smallness and negative conditioning --if you only became an exemplar of humanity's highest potential for the world? Imagine that for you, evolving beyond ego became an evolutionary imperative. Would you approach your path any differently?
Would the energy you bring to your spiritual practice intensify? Would the quality of awareness and care with which you approached your interactions with others become more profound? Would you find yourself reaching with inner muscles you didn't even know you had to actually stay awake to the depth you've tasted in your most profound spiritual moments? If you knew it all rested on you, would you have any choice but to change?
The Indian sage Ramana Maharshi once said that the spiritual aspirant must want liberation like a drowning person wants air. Why? Because the challenges of authentic spiritual growth and transformation are so great that most of us will choose to continue suffering in our smallness, rather than feel the pain of allowing that smallness to die forever.
Modern science has in recent decades been verifying what the ancient traditions intuited long ago: that, in both tangible and mysterious ways, we are all interconnected. Any one of us can have a profound effect on the whole. Add to that the reality that we are evolving beings living in an evolving universe. We are all part of a grand, cosmic evolutionary process. Then the question of our obligation to the whole starts to cut close to the bone.
To reframe the earlier question: What if you realized that the entire human endeavor, the evolution of consciousness itself, depended on your willingness to evolve your own consciousness? How would it affect the choices you make every day if you knew that in a very real sense, those choices were either contributing to the evolution of the whole--or holding it back?
At this time when it seems that our very future depends on our willingness to evolve as a species, would you have any choice but to act in alignment with the greatest evolutionary good? The point is that when we take a closer look at what spiritual work and growth is actually for, it quickly becomes clear that the path of awakening is not primarily about freeing ourselves from suffering or securing our own happiness. Sure, that's a nice by-product. But, as long as that's all we're seeking, we probably won't get very far.
Where the spiritual path really begins to get interesting is when we recognize that transforming ourselves in the deepest possible way is in fact an evolutionary imperative, with profound consequences far beyond ourselves.
If we begin to embrace the fact that our lives are not simply our own to do with as we please--that in everything we do, we are in fact accountable to the Whole--something truly miraculous begins to happen. Faced with the palpable responsibility to evolve for a greater good, we find that we suddenly have access to a seemingly infinite source of energy, intention, passion and courage to confront whatever challenges present themselves on our path.
What's more, all of the personal issues and problems--all of the fears and doubts and resistances that once seemed so insurmountable--begin to seem a lot less significant. Why? Because our attention is now captivated by something much bigger than ourselves. This is the power of context.
We see our individual concerns, the worries we fret over day to day, from a different vantage point. Held up against this larger picture and greater purpose, those concerns suddenly seem very small indeed. Realizing "it's not all about me," and ignited by a noble calling to participate in the grand adventure of conscious evolution, we find we no longer even want to give those worries the time of day.
Where Do We Come From?
By analyzing the genetic variation of modern Europeans, Cavalli-Sforza and Ammerman decided that Europeans are descended largely from populations of farmers who started migrating out of the Middle East 9,000 years ago. As the sons and daughters of farming families left their parents’ farms and moved into new territory, they interbred with the existing hunter-gatherer populations, which produced gradients of genetic change radiating from the Middle East.
Only in mountainous areas unattractive to farmers—the Pyrenees homelands of the Basques, for example—were the genes of the indigenous peoples comparatively intact. Other historical events, too, appeared to have influenced the European gene pool. For example, a genetic trail leads from the area north of the Black and Caspian Seas into the rest of Europe. Cavalli-Sforza linked this trail to the spread of the descendants of nomadic warriors and herders who first domesticated the horse, about 4,000 B.C.
Evidence clearly indicates that sometime in the period 100,000 to 200,000 years ago our ancestors went through a severe genetic bottleneck. Perhaps an environmental change drove ancient people to the brink of extinction. A more likely scenario, however, is that a relatively small group, numbering fewer than 20,000 at times and probably living in eastern Africa, was isolated for many thousands of years from the many groups of archaic human beings scattered throughout Africa, Europe, and Asia.
The people who emerged from this genetic bottleneck had traits never before seen in human beings. They had lighter builds, new ways of interacting among themselves, and perhaps a greater facility with language. Eventually the descendants of these people spread throughout Africa and beyond.
They reached Australia at least 60,000 years ago, probably traveling from the Horn of Africa and then along the South Asia shoreline. They arrived in the Middle East a bit more than 40,000 years ago. By 35,000 years ago anatomically modern people had spread into Europe from the Middle East and into East Asia from Southeast Asia. Sometime more than 12,000 years ago they entered the Americas.
Fewer than 10,000 generations separate everyone alive today from the small group of Africans who are our common ancestors. That’s much more than the twenty or so generations mentioned in Genesis, but it’s the blink of an eye in evolutionary terms. Even over thousands of generations human groups have not differentiated in any substantial way.
Rather, the genetic evidence indicates that modern human beings have expanded as a single, relatively well mixed population without subsequent genetic bottlenecks (bottlenecks tend to erase the evidence of previous bottlenecks, which is how geneticists know that the bottleneck in Africa was the most recent one). Our comparative youth as a species accounts for our extreme genetic homogeneity. The chimpanzees living on a single hillside in Africa have twice as much variety in their DNA as do the six billion people scattered across the globe.
There’s another reason for our biological homogeneity. Modern human beings have never been able to resist for long what Noël Coward called “the urge to merge.” A person traveling due east from Madrid to Beijing (both at about 40°N latitude) would pass Italians, Greeks, Turks, Armenians, Uzbeks, Tajiks, Kyrgyz, Uighurs, Mongolians, and Han Chinese, among others. All these groups resemble their immediate neighbors more than they do groups farther away because of the continual exchange of mates across group boundaries.
There’s a simple way of describing our genetic relatedness. Not only do all people have the same set of genes, but all groups of people also share the major variants of those genes. Geneticists have never found a genetic marker that is of one type in all the members of one large group and of a different type in all the members of another large group. That’s why ethnically targeted biological weapons would never work. Every group overlaps genetically with every other. We have cultural differences masquerading as race problems.
http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2001/04/the-genetic-archaeology-of-race/2180/
There is no singular gene, mutation, allele, STR or SNP that tells the whole story. There are clusters of mutations that show deep relationship patterns of regional origin in some individuals. There is no DNA report that is 100% conclusive. They use the statistical mathematics of the educated guess.
Statistical and sampling flaws can lead to misinterpretations, based on too small of samplings and comparison studies. So, our own conclusions about our own DNA tests are, in part, interpretations of an interpretation. We can only draw inferences about the past based on the patterns observed in human DNA. And this is what keeps our quest alive.
http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2001/04/the-genetic-archaeology-of-race/2180/
Holy Grail by Alex Grey
Genetic mapping helps to show that a mutation from RH positive to RH negative occurred somewhere in the Basque area of Europe maybe as much as 40,000 years ago. So what happened then? Ice Age Polarity Reversal Was Global Event: Extremely Brief Reversal of Geomagnetic Field, Climate Variability, and Super Volcano
ScienceDaily — Some 41,000 years ago, a complete and rapid reversal of the geomagnetic field occurred. Magnetic studies of the GFZ German Research Centre for Geosciences on sediment cores from the Black Sea show that during this period, during the last ice age, a compass at the Black Sea would have pointed to the south instead of north. Moreover, data obtained by the research team formed around GFZ researchers Dr. Norbert Nowaczyk and Prof. Helge Arz, together with additional data from other studies in the North Atlantic, the South Pacific and Hawaii, prove that this polarity reversal was a global event. Their results are published in the latest issue of the scientific journal Earth and Planetary Science Letters. What is remarkable is the speed of the reversal: "The field geometry of reversed polarity, with field lines pointing into the opposite direction when compared to today's configuration, lasted for only about 440 years, and it was associated with a field strength that was only one quarter of today's field," explains Norbert Nowaczyk. "The actual polarity changes lasted only 250 years. In terms of geological time scales, that is very fast." During this period, the field was even weaker, with only 5% of today's field strength. As a consequence, Earth nearly completely lost its protection shield against hard cosmic rays, leading to a significantly increased radiation exposure. QUEST FOR THE HOLY GRAIL
Bloodline of Self-Knowledge
Our DNA is like a history encyclopedia. It tells us the stories of our forebearers from the first human who walked on the earth to YOU. Different DNA regions can tell us whether our ancestors interbred with Neanderthals, while other regions tell us about the path our ancestors took out of Africa. It all depends on what you want to know and your ability to interpret the genetic code.
Who Are We?
The best way to determine the genetic relationships among people is to compare the sequences of the nucleotides in their DNA. We perform a service just following the DNA trail and accepting new findings in our family trees when they come in, instead of clinging to an a priori theory/belief/wish or prejudice. Even with both a pedigree and genetic genealogy tests, the results require interpretation, and even different members of the same family can embody and display different features.
So far, there is no exclusive nor conlusive DNA signature for the Grail lineage, and there are gaps in the legends, the histories, and the pedigrees which require interpretation if not leaps of imagination. This is true for those of unbroken dynastic Houses as it is for those of mixed blood. Grail houses can have different Y haplogroups as well as different mtDNA signatures. While the "red gene" is significant, it may or may not distinguish noble ancestors. Typical medical problems of a line will not all present in one individual.
For example, Rh negative blood, being recessive, will only reveal itself when 2 recessive genes from the parents come together. Conceivably, only one sibling in a dozen might be Rh negative, descended from Rh positive parents. Even siblings get varied genetic packages and may not have genes from all the ethnicities of their genealogical lines. There are different ethnic signatures. Genetic Archaeology of ancient groups and individuals is a new research area. Genetic Archaeology is the study of genetic ancestry using modern forensic techniques to collect and blueprint ancient human remains, and rarely identify living descendants.
DNA can be used to understand the evolution of modern humans, trace migrations of people, identify individuals, and determine the origins of domestic plants and animals. DNA analysis, as one scholar put it, is "the greatest archaeological excavation of all time." Because ancient DNA molecules are normally so few and fragmented, and preserved soft tissues so rare, scientists had little hope of finding and analyzing it. But two breakthroughs have made this possible: the polymerase chain reaction (PCR), a method for copying any fragment of DNA, and the successful recovery of DNA from preserved hard tissues, bones and teeth, that are durable and relatively abundant. http://www.archaeology.org/9609/abstracts/dna.html
Your individual DNA fingerprint depends on how the chromosomes line up at conception. Some traits from both parents' potentials will be there, while others get excluded. So, some siblings can be redheads, others not; some can have family medical problems, others not, some may be Rh neg., others not. Extensive historical knowledge of cultural practices and human migratory patterns helps us piece each story together. We may find things we never imagined and find no evidence for traits known within our lineage.
Genetic reconstructions of historical events can always be interpreted in somewhat different ways, observes Peter Underhill, the geneticist in Cavalli-Sforza's lab who first detected variations in Y chromosomes. DNA is such a long and complex molecule that every act of human procreation produces at least some unique mutations. These mutations spill across the generations like an unusually shaped jaw or distinctively colored eyes. The result is an elaborate human genealogy, an intricately branching tree of genetic alterations.
Where Do We Come From?
By analyzing the genetic variation of modern Europeans, Cavalli-Sforza and Ammerman decided that Europeans are descended largely from populations of farmers who started migrating out of the Middle East 9,000 years ago. As the sons and daughters of farming families left their parents' farms and moved into new territory, they interbred with the existing hunter-gatherer populations, which produced gradients of genetic change radiating from the Middle East. Only in mountainous areas unattractive to farmers—the Pyrenees homelands of the Basques, for example—were the genes of the indigenous peoples comparatively intact. Other historical events, too, appeared to have influenced the European gene pool. For example, a genetic trail leads from the area north of the Black and Caspian Seas into the rest of Europe. Cavalli-Sforza linked this trail to the spread of the descendants of nomadic warriors and herders who first domesticated the horse, about 4,000 B.C.
Evidence clearly indicates that sometime in the period 100,000 to 200,000 years ago our ancestors went through a severe genetic bottleneck. Perhaps an environmental change drove ancient people to the brink of extinction. A more likely scenario, however, is that a relatively small group, numbering fewer than 20,000 at times and probably living in eastern Africa, was isolated for many thousands of years from the many groups of archaic human beings scattered throughout Africa, Europe, and Asia.
The people who emerged from this genetic bottleneck had traits never before seen in human beings. They had lighter builds, new ways of interacting among themselves, and perhaps a greater facility with language. Eventually the descendants of these people spread throughout Africa and beyond. They reached Australia at least 60,000 years ago, probably traveling from the Horn of Africa and then along the South Asia shoreline. They arrived in the Middle East a bit more than 40,000 years ago. By 35,000 years ago anatomically modern people had spread into Europe from the Middle East and into East Asia from Southeast Asia. Sometime more than 12,000 years ago they entered the Americas.
Fewer than 10,000 generations separate everyone alive today from the small group of Africans who are our common ancestors. That's much more than the twenty or so generations mentioned in Genesis, but it's the blink of an eye in evolutionary terms. Even over thousands of generations human groups have not differentiated in any substantial way. Rather, the genetic evidence indicates that modern human beings have expanded as a single, relatively well mixed population without subsequent genetic bottlenecks (bottlenecks tend to erase the evidence of previous bottlenecks, which is how geneticists know that the bottleneck in Africa was the most recent one). Our comparative youth as a species accounts for our extreme genetic homogeneity. The chimpanzees living on a single hillside in Africa have twice as much variety in their DNA as do the six billion people scattered across the globe.
There's another reason for our biological homogeneity. Modern human beings have never been able to resist for long what Noël Coward called "the urge to merge." A person traveling due east from Madrid to Beijing (both at about 40°N latitude) would pass Italians, Greeks, Turks, Armenians, Uzbeks, Tajiks, Kyrgyz, Uighurs, Mongolians, and Han Chinese, among others. All these groups resemble their immediate neighbors more than they do groups farther away because of the continual exchange of mates across group boundaries.
There's a simple way of describing our genetic relatedness. Not only do all people have the same set of genes, but all groups of people also share the major variants of those genes. Geneticists have never found a genetic marker that is of one type in all the members of one large group and of a different type in all the members of another large group. That's why ethnically targeted biological weapons would never work. Every group overlaps genetically with every other. We have cultural differences masquerading as race problems.
http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2001/04/the-genetic-archaeology-of-race/2180/
Where Are We Going?
There is no singular gene, mutation, allele, STR or SNP that tells the whole story. There are clusters of mutations that show deep relationship patterns of regional origin in some individuals. There is no DNA report that is 100% conclusive. They use the statistical mathematics of the educated guess. Statistical and sampling flaws can lead to misinterpretations, based on too small of samplings and comparison studies. So, our own conclusions about our own DNA tests are, in part, interpretations of an interpretation. We can only draw inferences about the past based on the patterns observed in human DNA. And this is what keeps our quest alive. http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2001/04/the-genetic-archaeology-of-race/2180/
allele /al·lele/ (ah-lēl´) one of two or more alternative forms of a gene at corresponding sites (loci) on homologous chromosomes, which determine alternative characters in inheritance.allel´ic
A single-nucleotide polymorphism (SNP, pronounced snip) is a DNA sequence variation occurring when a single nucleotide — A, T, C or G — in the genome (or other shared sequence) differs between members of a biological species or paired chromosomes in an individual.
A surname DNA project is a genetic genealogy project which uses genealogical DNA tests to trace male lineage. Because (patrilineal) surnames are passed down from father to son in many cultures, and Y-chromosomes (Y-DNA) are passed from father to son with a predictable rate of mutation, people with the same surname can use genealogical DNA testing to determine if they share a common ancestor within recent history. A genealogical DNA test looks at a person's genetic code at specific locations. Results give information about genealogy or personal ancestry. Generally, these tests compare the results of an individual to others from the same lineage or to current and historic ethnic groups. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genealogical_DNA_test
ScienceDaily — Some 41,000 years ago, a complete and rapid reversal of the geomagnetic field occurred. Magnetic studies of the GFZ German Research Centre for Geosciences on sediment cores from the Black Sea show that during this period, during the last ice age, a compass at the Black Sea would have pointed to the south instead of north. Moreover, data obtained by the research team formed around GFZ researchers Dr. Norbert Nowaczyk and Prof. Helge Arz, together with additional data from other studies in the North Atlantic, the South Pacific and Hawaii, prove that this polarity reversal was a global event. Their results are published in the latest issue of the scientific journal Earth and Planetary Science Letters. What is remarkable is the speed of the reversal: "The field geometry of reversed polarity, with field lines pointing into the opposite direction when compared to today's configuration, lasted for only about 440 years, and it was associated with a field strength that was only one quarter of today's field," explains Norbert Nowaczyk. "The actual polarity changes lasted only 250 years. In terms of geological time scales, that is very fast." During this period, the field was even weaker, with only 5% of today's field strength. As a consequence, Earth nearly completely lost its protection shield against hard cosmic rays, leading to a significantly increased radiation exposure. QUEST FOR THE HOLY GRAIL
Bloodline of Self-Knowledge
Our DNA is like a history encyclopedia. It tells us the stories of our forebearers from the first human who walked on the earth to YOU. Different DNA regions can tell us whether our ancestors interbred with Neanderthals, while other regions tell us about the path our ancestors took out of Africa. It all depends on what you want to know and your ability to interpret the genetic code.
Who Are We?
The best way to determine the genetic relationships among people is to compare the sequences of the nucleotides in their DNA. We perform a service just following the DNA trail and accepting new findings in our family trees when they come in, instead of clinging to an a priori theory/belief/wish or prejudice. Even with both a pedigree and genetic genealogy tests, the results require interpretation, and even different members of the same family can embody and display different features.
So far, there is no exclusive nor conlusive DNA signature for the Grail lineage, and there are gaps in the legends, the histories, and the pedigrees which require interpretation if not leaps of imagination. This is true for those of unbroken dynastic Houses as it is for those of mixed blood. Grail houses can have different Y haplogroups as well as different mtDNA signatures. While the "red gene" is significant, it may or may not distinguish noble ancestors. Typical medical problems of a line will not all present in one individual.
For example, Rh negative blood, being recessive, will only reveal itself when 2 recessive genes from the parents come together. Conceivably, only one sibling in a dozen might be Rh negative, descended from Rh positive parents. Even siblings get varied genetic packages and may not have genes from all the ethnicities of their genealogical lines. There are different ethnic signatures. Genetic Archaeology of ancient groups and individuals is a new research area. Genetic Archaeology is the study of genetic ancestry using modern forensic techniques to collect and blueprint ancient human remains, and rarely identify living descendants.
DNA can be used to understand the evolution of modern humans, trace migrations of people, identify individuals, and determine the origins of domestic plants and animals. DNA analysis, as one scholar put it, is "the greatest archaeological excavation of all time." Because ancient DNA molecules are normally so few and fragmented, and preserved soft tissues so rare, scientists had little hope of finding and analyzing it. But two breakthroughs have made this possible: the polymerase chain reaction (PCR), a method for copying any fragment of DNA, and the successful recovery of DNA from preserved hard tissues, bones and teeth, that are durable and relatively abundant. http://www.archaeology.org/9609/abstracts/dna.html
Your individual DNA fingerprint depends on how the chromosomes line up at conception. Some traits from both parents' potentials will be there, while others get excluded. So, some siblings can be redheads, others not; some can have family medical problems, others not, some may be Rh neg., others not. Extensive historical knowledge of cultural practices and human migratory patterns helps us piece each story together. We may find things we never imagined and find no evidence for traits known within our lineage.
Genetic reconstructions of historical events can always be interpreted in somewhat different ways, observes Peter Underhill, the geneticist in Cavalli-Sforza's lab who first detected variations in Y chromosomes. DNA is such a long and complex molecule that every act of human procreation produces at least some unique mutations. These mutations spill across the generations like an unusually shaped jaw or distinctively colored eyes. The result is an elaborate human genealogy, an intricately branching tree of genetic alterations.
Where Do We Come From?
By analyzing the genetic variation of modern Europeans, Cavalli-Sforza and Ammerman decided that Europeans are descended largely from populations of farmers who started migrating out of the Middle East 9,000 years ago. As the sons and daughters of farming families left their parents' farms and moved into new territory, they interbred with the existing hunter-gatherer populations, which produced gradients of genetic change radiating from the Middle East. Only in mountainous areas unattractive to farmers—the Pyrenees homelands of the Basques, for example—were the genes of the indigenous peoples comparatively intact. Other historical events, too, appeared to have influenced the European gene pool. For example, a genetic trail leads from the area north of the Black and Caspian Seas into the rest of Europe. Cavalli-Sforza linked this trail to the spread of the descendants of nomadic warriors and herders who first domesticated the horse, about 4,000 B.C.
Evidence clearly indicates that sometime in the period 100,000 to 200,000 years ago our ancestors went through a severe genetic bottleneck. Perhaps an environmental change drove ancient people to the brink of extinction. A more likely scenario, however, is that a relatively small group, numbering fewer than 20,000 at times and probably living in eastern Africa, was isolated for many thousands of years from the many groups of archaic human beings scattered throughout Africa, Europe, and Asia.
The people who emerged from this genetic bottleneck had traits never before seen in human beings. They had lighter builds, new ways of interacting among themselves, and perhaps a greater facility with language. Eventually the descendants of these people spread throughout Africa and beyond. They reached Australia at least 60,000 years ago, probably traveling from the Horn of Africa and then along the South Asia shoreline. They arrived in the Middle East a bit more than 40,000 years ago. By 35,000 years ago anatomically modern people had spread into Europe from the Middle East and into East Asia from Southeast Asia. Sometime more than 12,000 years ago they entered the Americas.
Fewer than 10,000 generations separate everyone alive today from the small group of Africans who are our common ancestors. That's much more than the twenty or so generations mentioned in Genesis, but it's the blink of an eye in evolutionary terms. Even over thousands of generations human groups have not differentiated in any substantial way. Rather, the genetic evidence indicates that modern human beings have expanded as a single, relatively well mixed population without subsequent genetic bottlenecks (bottlenecks tend to erase the evidence of previous bottlenecks, which is how geneticists know that the bottleneck in Africa was the most recent one). Our comparative youth as a species accounts for our extreme genetic homogeneity. The chimpanzees living on a single hillside in Africa have twice as much variety in their DNA as do the six billion people scattered across the globe.
There's another reason for our biological homogeneity. Modern human beings have never been able to resist for long what Noël Coward called "the urge to merge." A person traveling due east from Madrid to Beijing (both at about 40°N latitude) would pass Italians, Greeks, Turks, Armenians, Uzbeks, Tajiks, Kyrgyz, Uighurs, Mongolians, and Han Chinese, among others. All these groups resemble their immediate neighbors more than they do groups farther away because of the continual exchange of mates across group boundaries.
There's a simple way of describing our genetic relatedness. Not only do all people have the same set of genes, but all groups of people also share the major variants of those genes. Geneticists have never found a genetic marker that is of one type in all the members of one large group and of a different type in all the members of another large group. That's why ethnically targeted biological weapons would never work. Every group overlaps genetically with every other. We have cultural differences masquerading as race problems.
http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2001/04/the-genetic-archaeology-of-race/2180/
Where Are We Going?
There is no singular gene, mutation, allele, STR or SNP that tells the whole story. There are clusters of mutations that show deep relationship patterns of regional origin in some individuals. There is no DNA report that is 100% conclusive. They use the statistical mathematics of the educated guess. Statistical and sampling flaws can lead to misinterpretations, based on too small of samplings and comparison studies. So, our own conclusions about our own DNA tests are, in part, interpretations of an interpretation. We can only draw inferences about the past based on the patterns observed in human DNA. And this is what keeps our quest alive. http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2001/04/the-genetic-archaeology-of-race/2180/
allele /al·lele/ (ah-lēl´) one of two or more alternative forms of a gene at corresponding sites (loci) on homologous chromosomes, which determine alternative characters in inheritance.allel´ic
A single-nucleotide polymorphism (SNP, pronounced snip) is a DNA sequence variation occurring when a single nucleotide — A, T, C or G — in the genome (or other shared sequence) differs between members of a biological species or paired chromosomes in an individual.
A surname DNA project is a genetic genealogy project which uses genealogical DNA tests to trace male lineage. Because (patrilineal) surnames are passed down from father to son in many cultures, and Y-chromosomes (Y-DNA) are passed from father to son with a predictable rate of mutation, people with the same surname can use genealogical DNA testing to determine if they share a common ancestor within recent history. A genealogical DNA test looks at a person's genetic code at specific locations. Results give information about genealogy or personal ancestry. Generally, these tests compare the results of an individual to others from the same lineage or to current and historic ethnic groups. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genealogical_DNA_test
The Pulse of Evolution
Europeans All Closely Related, Gene Study Shows
By Tia Ghose, LiveScience Staff Writer | LiveScience.com
Europeans all shared a common ancestor just 1,000 years ago, new genetic research reveals.
Scientists drew this conclusion, detailed today (May 7) in the journal PLOS Biology, by calculating the length of regions of shared DNA from 2,000 Europeans.
The same technique hasn't been applied to other continents, but people in other parts of the world are just as likely to be closely related, the researchers said.
"In fact, it's likely that everyone in the world is related over just the past few thousand years," said study co-author Graham Coop, a geneticist at the University of California, Davis.
All in the family
For more than a decade, researchers calculated theoretically that all people shared common ancestors fairly recently.
To test that theory, Coop and his colleagues analyzed 500,000 spots on the genome of Europeans, from Turkey to the United Kingdom. To untangle European ancestry, they calculated the length of shared segments of DNA, or the molecules that contain the genetic instructions for life. When two people share a longer stretch of identical DNA, they are likely to share a more recent common ancestor, since over time those gene segments evolve and diversify.
The researchers found that all Europeans shared a common ancestor just 1,000 years ago.
There were also some regional surprises.
For instance, Italians are slightly less related to one another than people from other European countries are to one another, perhaps because Italians have had a large, fairly stable population for a few thousand years.
In addition, people from the United Kingdom are more related to people from Ireland than they are to other people from the United Kingdom. That's possibly because many people have migrated from the smaller country of Ireland to the bigger United Kingdom in the past several hundred years.
The researchers also showed that people in Eastern Europe were slightly more related to each other than were those in Western Europe.
Recent history
That may be he signature of Slavic expansion and migrations, such as those of the Huns and the Goths, about 1,000 years ago, said John Novembre, a population geneticist at the University of Chicago, who was not involved in the study.
The new findings are exciting because they allow researchers to trace much more recent human history.
"In the past human geneticists have been able to focus on the types of population movement that have taken place over tens of thousands of years — like moving out of Africa and into Eurasia," Novembre told LiveScience. "They're starting to see population movements that have taken place in the middle ages."
By Tia Ghose, LiveScience Staff Writer | LiveScience.com
Europeans all shared a common ancestor just 1,000 years ago, new genetic research reveals.
Scientists drew this conclusion, detailed today (May 7) in the journal PLOS Biology, by calculating the length of regions of shared DNA from 2,000 Europeans.
The same technique hasn't been applied to other continents, but people in other parts of the world are just as likely to be closely related, the researchers said.
"In fact, it's likely that everyone in the world is related over just the past few thousand years," said study co-author Graham Coop, a geneticist at the University of California, Davis.
All in the family
For more than a decade, researchers calculated theoretically that all people shared common ancestors fairly recently.
To test that theory, Coop and his colleagues analyzed 500,000 spots on the genome of Europeans, from Turkey to the United Kingdom. To untangle European ancestry, they calculated the length of shared segments of DNA, or the molecules that contain the genetic instructions for life. When two people share a longer stretch of identical DNA, they are likely to share a more recent common ancestor, since over time those gene segments evolve and diversify.
The researchers found that all Europeans shared a common ancestor just 1,000 years ago.
There were also some regional surprises.
For instance, Italians are slightly less related to one another than people from other European countries are to one another, perhaps because Italians have had a large, fairly stable population for a few thousand years.
In addition, people from the United Kingdom are more related to people from Ireland than they are to other people from the United Kingdom. That's possibly because many people have migrated from the smaller country of Ireland to the bigger United Kingdom in the past several hundred years.
The researchers also showed that people in Eastern Europe were slightly more related to each other than were those in Western Europe.
Recent history
That may be he signature of Slavic expansion and migrations, such as those of the Huns and the Goths, about 1,000 years ago, said John Novembre, a population geneticist at the University of Chicago, who was not involved in the study.
The new findings are exciting because they allow researchers to trace much more recent human history.
"In the past human geneticists have been able to focus on the types of population movement that have taken place over tens of thousands of years — like moving out of Africa and into Eurasia," Novembre told LiveScience. "They're starting to see population movements that have taken place in the middle ages."
Almost every man alive can trace his origins to one man who lived about 135,000 years ago, new research suggests. And that ancient man likely shared the planet with the mother of all women. The findings, detailed today (Aug. 1) in the journal Science, come from the most complete analysis of the male sex chromosome, or the Y chromosome, to date. The results overturn earlier research, which suggested that men's most recent common ancestor lived just 50,000 to 60,000 years ago.
Despite their overlap in time, ancient "Adam" and ancient "Eve" probably didn't even live near each other, let alone mate. [The 10 Biggest Mysteries of the First Humans]
"Those two people didn't know each other," said Melissa Wilson Sayres, a geneticist at the University of California, Berkeley, who was not involved in the study.
Tracing history
Researchers believe that modern humans left Africa between 60,000 and 200,000 years ago, and that the mother of all women likely emerged from East Africa. But beyond that, the details get fuzzy.
The Y chromosome is passed down identically from father to son, so mutations, or point changes, in the male sex chromosome can trace the male line back to the father of all humans. By contrast, DNA from the mitochondria, the energy powerhouse of the cell, is carried inside the egg, so only women pass it on to their children. The DNA hidden inside mitochondria, therefore, can reveal the maternal lineage to an ancient Eve.
But over time, the male chromosome gets bloated with duplicated, jumbled-up stretches of DNA, said study co-author Carlos Bustamante, a geneticist at Stanford University in California. As a result, piecing together fragments of DNA from gene sequencing was like trying to assemble a puzzle without the image on the box top, making thorough analysis difficult.
Y chromosome
Bustamante and his colleagues assembled a much bigger piece of the puzzle by sequencing the entire genome of the Y chromosome for 69 men from seven global populations, from African San Bushmen to the Yakut of Siberia.
By assuming a mutation rate anchored to archaeological events (such as the migration of people across the Bering Strait), the team concluded that all males in their global sample shared a single male ancestor in Africa roughly 125,000 to 156,000 years ago.
In addition, mitochondrial DNA from the men, as well as similar samples from 24 women, revealed that all women on the planet trace back to a mitochondrial Eve, who lived in Africa between 99,000 and 148,000 years ago — almost the same time period during which the Y-chromosome Adam lived.
More ancient Adam
But the results, though fascinating, are just part of the story, said Michael Hammer, an evolutionary geneticist at the University of Arizona who was not involved in the study.
A separate study in the same issue of the journal Science found that men shared a common ancestor between 180,000 and 200,000 years ago.
And in a study detailed in March in the American Journal of Human Genetics, Hammer's group showed that several men in Africa have unique, divergent Y chromosomes that trace back to an even more ancient man who lived between 237,000 and 581,000 years ago. [Unraveling the Human Genome: 6 Molecular Milestones]
"It doesn't even fit on the family tree that the Bustamante lab has constructed — It's older," Hammer told LiveScience.
Gene studies always rely on a sample of DNA and, therefore, provide an incomplete picture of human history. For instance, Hammer's group sampled a different group of men than Bustamante's lab did, leading to different estimates of how old common ancestors really are.
Adam and Eve?
These primeval people aren't parallel to the biblical Adam and Eve. They weren't the first modern humans on the planet, but instead just the two out of thousands of people alive at the time with unbroken male or female lineages that continue on today.
The rest of the human genome contains tiny snippets of DNA from many other ancestors — they just don't show up in mitochondrial or Y-chromosome DNA, Hammer said. (For instance, if an ancient woman had only sons, then her mitochondrial DNA would disappear, even though the son would pass on a quarter of her DNA via the rest of his genome.)
As a follow-up, Bustamante's lab is sequencing Y chromosomes from nearly 2,000 other men. Those data could help pinpoint precisely where in Africa these ancient humans lived.
"It's very exciting," Wilson Sayres told LiveScience. "As we get more populations across the world, we can start to understand exactly where we came from physically." Copyright 2013 LiveScience, http://news.yahoo.com/genetic-adam-eve-uncovered-180706860.html
Despite their overlap in time, ancient "Adam" and ancient "Eve" probably didn't even live near each other, let alone mate. [The 10 Biggest Mysteries of the First Humans]
"Those two people didn't know each other," said Melissa Wilson Sayres, a geneticist at the University of California, Berkeley, who was not involved in the study.
Tracing history
Researchers believe that modern humans left Africa between 60,000 and 200,000 years ago, and that the mother of all women likely emerged from East Africa. But beyond that, the details get fuzzy.
The Y chromosome is passed down identically from father to son, so mutations, or point changes, in the male sex chromosome can trace the male line back to the father of all humans. By contrast, DNA from the mitochondria, the energy powerhouse of the cell, is carried inside the egg, so only women pass it on to their children. The DNA hidden inside mitochondria, therefore, can reveal the maternal lineage to an ancient Eve.
But over time, the male chromosome gets bloated with duplicated, jumbled-up stretches of DNA, said study co-author Carlos Bustamante, a geneticist at Stanford University in California. As a result, piecing together fragments of DNA from gene sequencing was like trying to assemble a puzzle without the image on the box top, making thorough analysis difficult.
Y chromosome
Bustamante and his colleagues assembled a much bigger piece of the puzzle by sequencing the entire genome of the Y chromosome for 69 men from seven global populations, from African San Bushmen to the Yakut of Siberia.
By assuming a mutation rate anchored to archaeological events (such as the migration of people across the Bering Strait), the team concluded that all males in their global sample shared a single male ancestor in Africa roughly 125,000 to 156,000 years ago.
In addition, mitochondrial DNA from the men, as well as similar samples from 24 women, revealed that all women on the planet trace back to a mitochondrial Eve, who lived in Africa between 99,000 and 148,000 years ago — almost the same time period during which the Y-chromosome Adam lived.
More ancient Adam
But the results, though fascinating, are just part of the story, said Michael Hammer, an evolutionary geneticist at the University of Arizona who was not involved in the study.
A separate study in the same issue of the journal Science found that men shared a common ancestor between 180,000 and 200,000 years ago.
And in a study detailed in March in the American Journal of Human Genetics, Hammer's group showed that several men in Africa have unique, divergent Y chromosomes that trace back to an even more ancient man who lived between 237,000 and 581,000 years ago. [Unraveling the Human Genome: 6 Molecular Milestones]
"It doesn't even fit on the family tree that the Bustamante lab has constructed — It's older," Hammer told LiveScience.
Gene studies always rely on a sample of DNA and, therefore, provide an incomplete picture of human history. For instance, Hammer's group sampled a different group of men than Bustamante's lab did, leading to different estimates of how old common ancestors really are.
Adam and Eve?
These primeval people aren't parallel to the biblical Adam and Eve. They weren't the first modern humans on the planet, but instead just the two out of thousands of people alive at the time with unbroken male or female lineages that continue on today.
The rest of the human genome contains tiny snippets of DNA from many other ancestors — they just don't show up in mitochondrial or Y-chromosome DNA, Hammer said. (For instance, if an ancient woman had only sons, then her mitochondrial DNA would disappear, even though the son would pass on a quarter of her DNA via the rest of his genome.)
As a follow-up, Bustamante's lab is sequencing Y chromosomes from nearly 2,000 other men. Those data could help pinpoint precisely where in Africa these ancient humans lived.
"It's very exciting," Wilson Sayres told LiveScience. "As we get more populations across the world, we can start to understand exactly where we came from physically." Copyright 2013 LiveScience, http://news.yahoo.com/genetic-adam-eve-uncovered-180706860.html
Russian paper on Genetic Signal
http://arxiv.org/ftp/arxiv/papers/1303/1303.6739.pdf
http://arxiv.org/ftp/arxiv/papers/1303/1303.6739.pdf
It is in my view a great mistake to suppose that the psyche of a new-born child is a tabula rasa in the sense that there is absolutely nothing in it. In so far as the child is born with a differentiated brain that is predetermined by heredity and therefore individualized, it meets sensory stimuli coming from outside not with any aptitudes, but with specific ones, and this necessarily results in a particular, individual choice and pattern of apperception. These aptitudes can be shown to be inherited instincts and preformed patterns, the latter being the a priori and formal conditions of apperception that are based on instinct. Their presence gives the world of the child and the dreamer its anthropomorphic stamp. They are the archetypes, which direct all fantasy activity into its appointed paths and in this way produce, in the fantasy-images of children's dreams as well as in the delusions of schizophrenia, astonishing mythological parallels such as can also be found, though in lesser degree, in the dreams of normal persons and neurotics. It is not, therefore, a question of inherited ideas but of inherited possibilities of ideas. ~"Concerning the Archetypes with Special Reference to the Anima Concept" (1936) In CW 9, Part I: The Archetypes and the Collective Unconscious. P. 136
• The original structural components of the psyche are of no less surprising uniformity than are those of the visible body. The archetypes are, so to speak, organs of the prerational psyche. They are eternally inherited forms and ideas which have at first no specific content. Their specific content only appears in the course of the individual's life, when personal experience is taken up in precisely this form. ~The Tibetan Book of the Dead. Foreword by C.G. Jung. (1954) In CW 11: Psychology and Religion: West and East. P. 845
• The original structural components of the psyche are of no less surprising uniformity than are those of the visible body. The archetypes are, so to speak, organs of the prerational psyche. They are eternally inherited forms and ideas which have at first no specific content. Their specific content only appears in the course of the individual's life, when personal experience is taken up in precisely this form. ~The Tibetan Book of the Dead. Foreword by C.G. Jung. (1954) In CW 11: Psychology and Religion: West and East. P. 845
Genetic genealogy is the application of genetics to traditional genealogy. Genetic genealogy involves the use of genealogical DNA testing to determine the level of genetic relationship between individuals and archaic tribes.
Human sex-determining chromosomes: X chromosome (left) and the much smaller Y chromosome.
Human Y chromosome much older than previously thought
March 4, 2013 by Daniel Stolte
March 4, 2013 by Daniel Stolte
(Phys.org) —University of Arizona geneticists have discovered the oldest known genetic branch of the human Y chromosome – the hereditary factor determining male sex.
The new divergent lineage, which was found in an individual who submitted his DNA to Family Tree DNA, a company specializing in DNA analysis to trace family roots, branched from the Y chromosome tree before the first appearance of anatomically modern humans in the fossil record.
The results are published in the American Journal of Human Genetics. "Our analysis indicates this lineage diverged from previously known Y chromosomes about 300,000 ago, a time when anatomically modern humans had not yet evolved," said Michael Hammer, an associate professor in the University of Arizona's department of ecology and evolutionary biology and a research scientist at the UA's Arizona Research Labs. "This pushes back the time the last common Y chromosome ancestor lived by almost 70 percent."
Unlike the other human chromosomes, the majority of the Y chromosome does not exchange genetic material with other chromosomes, which makes it simpler to trace ancestral relationships among contemporary lineages.
If two Y chromosomes carry the same mutation, it is because they share a common paternal ancestor at some point in the past. The more mutations that differ between two Y chromosomes the farther back in time the common ancestor lived. Originally, a DNA sample obtained from an African American living in South Carolina was submitted to the National Geographic Genographic Project. When none of the genetic markers used to assign lineages to known Y chromosome groupings were found, the DNA sample was sent to Family Tree DNA for sequencing.
Fernando Mendez, a postdoctoral researcher in Hammer's lab, led the effort to analyze the DNA sequence, which included more than 240,000 base pairs of the Y chromosome. Hammer said "the most striking feature of this research is that a consumer genetic testing company identified a lineage that didn't fit anywhere on the existing Y chromosome tree, even though the tree had been constructed based on perhaps a half-million individuals or more. Nobody expected to find anything like this."
About 300,000 years ago falls around the time the Neanderthals are believed to have split from the ancestral human lineage. It was not until more than 100,000 years later that anatomically modern humans appear in the fossil record. They differ from the more archaic forms by a more lightly built skeleton, a smaller face tucked under a high forehead, the absence of a cranial ridge and smaller chins.
Hammer said the newly discovered Y chromosome variation is extremely rare. Through large database searches, his team eventually was able to find a similar chromosome in the Mbo, a population living in a tiny area of western Cameroon in sub-Saharan Africa.
"This was surprising because previously the most diverged branches of the Y chromosome were found in traditional hunter-gatherer populations such as Pygmies and the click-speaking KhoeSan, who are considered to be the most diverged human populations living today." "Instead, the sample matched the Y chromosome DNA of 11 men, who all came from a very small region of western Cameroon," Hammer said. "And the sequences of those individuals are variable, so it's not like they all descended from the same grandfather."
Hammer cautions against popular concepts of "mitochondrial Eve" or "Y chromosome Adam" that suggest all of humankind descended from exactly one pair of humans that lived at a certain point in human evolution. "There has been too much emphasis on this in the past," he said. "It is a misconception that the genealogy of a single genetic region reflects population divergence. Instead, our results suggest that there are pockets of genetically isolated communities that together preserve a great deal of human diversity."
Still, Hammer said, "It is likely that other divergent lineages will be found, whether in Africa or among African-Americans in the U.S. and that some of these may further increase the age of the Y chromosome tree." He added: "There has been a lot of hype with people trying to trace their Y chromosome to different tribes, but this individual from South Carolina can say he did it."
More information: www.cell.com/AJHG/abstract/S0002-9297(13)00073-6
Journal reference: American Journal of Human Genetics search and more info website Provided by University of Arizona
Read more at: http://phys.org/news/2013-03-human-chromosome-older-previously-thought.html#jCp
The new divergent lineage, which was found in an individual who submitted his DNA to Family Tree DNA, a company specializing in DNA analysis to trace family roots, branched from the Y chromosome tree before the first appearance of anatomically modern humans in the fossil record.
The results are published in the American Journal of Human Genetics. "Our analysis indicates this lineage diverged from previously known Y chromosomes about 300,000 ago, a time when anatomically modern humans had not yet evolved," said Michael Hammer, an associate professor in the University of Arizona's department of ecology and evolutionary biology and a research scientist at the UA's Arizona Research Labs. "This pushes back the time the last common Y chromosome ancestor lived by almost 70 percent."
Unlike the other human chromosomes, the majority of the Y chromosome does not exchange genetic material with other chromosomes, which makes it simpler to trace ancestral relationships among contemporary lineages.
If two Y chromosomes carry the same mutation, it is because they share a common paternal ancestor at some point in the past. The more mutations that differ between two Y chromosomes the farther back in time the common ancestor lived. Originally, a DNA sample obtained from an African American living in South Carolina was submitted to the National Geographic Genographic Project. When none of the genetic markers used to assign lineages to known Y chromosome groupings were found, the DNA sample was sent to Family Tree DNA for sequencing.
Fernando Mendez, a postdoctoral researcher in Hammer's lab, led the effort to analyze the DNA sequence, which included more than 240,000 base pairs of the Y chromosome. Hammer said "the most striking feature of this research is that a consumer genetic testing company identified a lineage that didn't fit anywhere on the existing Y chromosome tree, even though the tree had been constructed based on perhaps a half-million individuals or more. Nobody expected to find anything like this."
About 300,000 years ago falls around the time the Neanderthals are believed to have split from the ancestral human lineage. It was not until more than 100,000 years later that anatomically modern humans appear in the fossil record. They differ from the more archaic forms by a more lightly built skeleton, a smaller face tucked under a high forehead, the absence of a cranial ridge and smaller chins.
Hammer said the newly discovered Y chromosome variation is extremely rare. Through large database searches, his team eventually was able to find a similar chromosome in the Mbo, a population living in a tiny area of western Cameroon in sub-Saharan Africa.
"This was surprising because previously the most diverged branches of the Y chromosome were found in traditional hunter-gatherer populations such as Pygmies and the click-speaking KhoeSan, who are considered to be the most diverged human populations living today." "Instead, the sample matched the Y chromosome DNA of 11 men, who all came from a very small region of western Cameroon," Hammer said. "And the sequences of those individuals are variable, so it's not like they all descended from the same grandfather."
Hammer cautions against popular concepts of "mitochondrial Eve" or "Y chromosome Adam" that suggest all of humankind descended from exactly one pair of humans that lived at a certain point in human evolution. "There has been too much emphasis on this in the past," he said. "It is a misconception that the genealogy of a single genetic region reflects population divergence. Instead, our results suggest that there are pockets of genetically isolated communities that together preserve a great deal of human diversity."
Still, Hammer said, "It is likely that other divergent lineages will be found, whether in Africa or among African-Americans in the U.S. and that some of these may further increase the age of the Y chromosome tree." He added: "There has been a lot of hype with people trying to trace their Y chromosome to different tribes, but this individual from South Carolina can say he did it."
More information: www.cell.com/AJHG/abstract/S0002-9297(13)00073-6
Journal reference: American Journal of Human Genetics search and more info website Provided by University of Arizona
Read more at: http://phys.org/news/2013-03-human-chromosome-older-previously-thought.html#jCp
DNA from the Beginning
http://www.dnalc.org/view/16206-Biography-5-William-Bateson-1861-1926-.html
William Bateson (1861-1926, father of Gregory Bateson) was born in Whitby, England. As a young boy, Bateson was asked what he wanted to be. He replied that he wanted to be a naturalist, but if he wasn't good enough then he would have to be a doctor. Bateson was not a star student - he didn't see the value of learning the "classics," and favored the natural sciences. In 1878, Bateson entered St. John's College at Cambridge University. His father was the master of the college at the time. As a student and later a researcher in Cambridge, Bateson was interested in species variation and heredity. He traveled to the Central Asian steppe and collected data on how environmental conditions relate to variation. In 1894, he published a book Materials for the Study of Variation based on his observations. In this book, he outlined the experimental approach that should be used to study inheritance. He was designing Mendelian experiments.
Around 1897, Bateson began doing some of these hybrid experiments with poultry and butterflies. When he read De Vries' and Mendel's papers, Bateson recognized the importance of "Mendelian Law," especially given his own experiments. By 1902, Bateson had translated Mendel's works into English and was a strong supporter of the Mendelian laws of inheritance. Bateson is credited with coining the terms "genetics," "allelomorphs" (later shortened to allele), "zygote," "heterozygote" and "homozygote." In 1908, as a Professor of Biology at Cambridge, Bateson helped establish the Cambridge School of Genetics.
Bateson left Cambridge in 1910 to accept the Directorship of the John Innes Horticultural Institute at Merton. He continued to have ties to Cambridge, collaborating with R. C. Punnett on genetic experiments and publications. Bateson and Punnett co-founded the Journal of Genetics in 1910.
Bateson's work and Bateson himself influenced other biologists and scientists such as Archibald Garrod, Thomas Hunt Morgan, and Charles Davenport. Bateson had a combative, forceful personality, well suited to his self-appointed role of Mendel advocate. However, Bateson was reluctant to believe in the chromosomal theory of inheritance. He was vocally antagonistic to the idea and it wasn't until 1922 after a visit to Thomas Hunt Morgan's fly lab that he publicly accepted chromosomes and their role in heredity.
http://www.dnalc.org/view/16206-Biography-5-William-Bateson-1861-1926-.html
William Bateson (1861-1926, father of Gregory Bateson) was born in Whitby, England. As a young boy, Bateson was asked what he wanted to be. He replied that he wanted to be a naturalist, but if he wasn't good enough then he would have to be a doctor. Bateson was not a star student - he didn't see the value of learning the "classics," and favored the natural sciences. In 1878, Bateson entered St. John's College at Cambridge University. His father was the master of the college at the time. As a student and later a researcher in Cambridge, Bateson was interested in species variation and heredity. He traveled to the Central Asian steppe and collected data on how environmental conditions relate to variation. In 1894, he published a book Materials for the Study of Variation based on his observations. In this book, he outlined the experimental approach that should be used to study inheritance. He was designing Mendelian experiments.
Around 1897, Bateson began doing some of these hybrid experiments with poultry and butterflies. When he read De Vries' and Mendel's papers, Bateson recognized the importance of "Mendelian Law," especially given his own experiments. By 1902, Bateson had translated Mendel's works into English and was a strong supporter of the Mendelian laws of inheritance. Bateson is credited with coining the terms "genetics," "allelomorphs" (later shortened to allele), "zygote," "heterozygote" and "homozygote." In 1908, as a Professor of Biology at Cambridge, Bateson helped establish the Cambridge School of Genetics.
Bateson left Cambridge in 1910 to accept the Directorship of the John Innes Horticultural Institute at Merton. He continued to have ties to Cambridge, collaborating with R. C. Punnett on genetic experiments and publications. Bateson and Punnett co-founded the Journal of Genetics in 1910.
Bateson's work and Bateson himself influenced other biologists and scientists such as Archibald Garrod, Thomas Hunt Morgan, and Charles Davenport. Bateson had a combative, forceful personality, well suited to his self-appointed role of Mendel advocate. However, Bateson was reluctant to believe in the chromosomal theory of inheritance. He was vocally antagonistic to the idea and it wasn't until 1922 after a visit to Thomas Hunt Morgan's fly lab that he publicly accepted chromosomes and their role in heredity.
Cells talk to one another chemically, turning genes on and off in adjacent nuclei.
St. John the Apostle with dragon
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This site contains copyrighted material the use of which has not always been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. We are making such material available in our efforts to advance understanding of environmental, political, human rights, economic, democracy, scientific, and social justice issues, etc. We believe this constitutes a 'fair use' of any such copyrighted material as provided for in section 107 of the US Copyright Law. In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, the material on this site is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes. If you wish to use copyrighted material from this site for purposes of your own that go beyond 'fair use', you must obtain permission from the copyright owner.