That is so cool. We had a course at penn state about race relations and it was one of the most popular courses on campus. The professor had everyone take one of those DNA tests (I think you had to pay out of pocket for it) but I'm not sure which one it was because I didn't end up taking the class but all my friends did. I know it was one of the more sensitive ones that was pretty expensive because it showed that most people had some DNA that could be traced back to Africa. If any penn staters reading this took this course and can correct me on this or know the brand of the test please feel free to correct me (I know there are some of you lurking out there)!
BBM Years ago, I read the book T
he Journey from Eden: The Peopling of Our World by Brian Fagen (??), sometime in the '90s, IIRC, about the Eve hypothesis- good book and sheds some light on Eve and the journey of humans through the centuries.
Let me see if I can find it on Amazon :thinking:
And here it is:
"From Library Journal
Fagan, an archaeologist and author of The Great Journey: The Peopling of Ancient America ( LJ 9/15/87) and other books, begins this account of the emergence of "anatomically modern" humans with the genetic evidence for a common human ancestor, nicknamed "Eve," living in Africa approximately 200,000 years ago. He then explores the evidence for two theories of human dispersal. The "Noah's Ark" school finds a single origin in sub-Saharan Africa for *advertiser censored* sapiens sapiens, who subsequently colonized the other continents, while the "Candelabra" school argues that *advertiser censored* erectus evolved independently into *advertiser censored* sapiens in Asia and possibly Europe. Some of this material appears in Michael E. Brown's The Search for Eve ( LJ 2/1/90), but Fagan's book is far more concise, authoritative, and articulate. Readers with some background in paleontology will find this book very rewarding.
- Beth Clewis, J. Sargeant Reynolds Community Coll. Lib., Richmond, Va.
Copyright 1990 Reed Business Information, Inc."
http://www.amazon.com/Journey-Eden-...4181727&sr=1-1&keywords=the+journey+from+eden
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Here are some articles on "Eve" and more discoveries that are facinating, IMO (if anyone is interested):
Genetic 'Adam' and 'Eve' Uncovered
"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..."
http://www.livescience.com/38613-genetic-adam-and-eve-uncovered.html
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African roots of the human family tree
"...Advanced DNA testing combined with recently unearthed discoveries are bolstering the belief that if you look back far enough, all living human beings are the descendents of a small, innovative and ambitious set of people on the African continent.
With the mapping of the human genome in 2003, combined with thousands of people around the world submitting their DNA for testing, there's now mounting physical proof we all started in Africa before migrating around the world.
Geneticists are able to identify certain genetic sequences or "markers" in each of us and cross-reference it with a number of ever-growing international databases. Where there's a match, there's likely a common ancestor and genetically speaking, all markers point to Africa..."
http://www.cnn.com/2013/05/14/world/africa/african-roots-dna/
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Mitochondrial Eve
"In human genetics, Mitochondrial Eve is the matrilineal most recent common ancestor (MRCA), in a direct, unbroken, maternal line, of all currently living humans, who is estimated to have lived approximately 100,000200,000 years ago. This is the most recent woman from whom all living humans today descend, in an unbroken line, on their mothers side, and through the mothers of those mothers, and so on, back until all lines converge on one person. Because all mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) generally (but see paternal mtDNA transmission) is passed from mother to offspring without recombination, all mtDNA in every living person is directly descended from hers by definition, differing only by the mutations that over generations have occurred in the germ cell mtDNA since the conception of the original "Mitochondrial Eve"..."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mitochondrial_Eve
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The Demise Of Mitochondrial Eve
"...Mitochondrial Eve is alleged to have lived in Africa at the beginning of the Upper Pleistocene period (between 100,000 and 200,000 years ago). She has been described as the most-recent common ancestor of all humans on Earth today, with respect to matrilineal descent. The validity of these assertions, however, is dependent upon two critically important assumptions: (1) that mtDNA is, in fact, derived exclusively from the mother; and (2) that the mutation rates associated with mtDNA have remained constant over time. However, we now know that both of these assumptions are wrong!
First, let us examine the assumption that mtDNA is derived solely from the mother..."
http://www.trueorigin.org/mitochondrialeve01.php
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