Global DNA Project to Study Human Ancestry

Steve writes "The National Geographic Society and IBM are teaming up to map the history of human migration using DNA. The Genographic Project aims to collect 100,000 genetic samples which will be used trace the movements of humans out of Africa and around the globe. While the most useful samples will come from indiginous populations, members of the general public will be able to mail in their own DNA on special cheek swabs."

Comments

What would be interesting...

[jd]

Is to compare the results with Oxford Ancestors, who perform a very similar service and have done for some years now. OA claim to be able to pinpoint a region from which you are ultimately descended on the female line, and to make a good guess of the same on the male line.

If OA's regions flat-out contradict NG's, then one or both sets of data must be wrong. A fatal flaw exists in an assumption that has been made. Which would be valuable to know, from a scientific standpoint, even if it would hurt sales.

If the two agree, it isn't proof that they are accurate, but provided the work was independently carried out, it raises the chances that they really are onto something.

Incremental Knowledge

[4of12]

The African exodus I think is pretty well understood. Although, there seems to have been multiple exodi (?) of hominid species that did not survive in the long term (such as the Neanderthal in Europe).

From what I understand, the story gets harder to piece together in the last part of the European migrations from Central Asia.

A couple of interesting TV shows on this were The Real Eve (which does the mitochondrial trace through maternal ancestral lines), and Journey of Man, which relates to the more difficult task of tracing mutations in the Y chromosome handed done through paternal lines.

One of the earlier pioneers in the field, Brian Sykes of Oxford, started up a side business where you can send swabs to obtain information about maternal and paternal markers in your genetic makeup (IIRC, about US$225).

A few years ago I got the analysis done and sent the results back to Ma 'n Pa for Mother's Day and Father's Day gifts.

Our Complex History

[J05H]

This is an interesting project, it will help to fill in the holes in the knowledge of our origins. Most cultures have legends of the journeys that led to settling a new home, with this research we will see much more clearly who went where,

Here is the map I want to see more fully realized:

http://www.mitomap.org/WorldMigrations.pdf

There are interesting legends and recent research that Genographic project might help: were there Austronesian ("aborigine") migrations across the Pacific 40,000 years ago? Are modern Tibetans and Athapaskan speakers (Navaho) related through the so-called Amur River Culture? When and how often have the "X" haplogroups travelled to America, and were these only Neolithic migrations or did they occur throughout the Bronze and Iron ages? Finally, how much back-migration occured from the Americas to the Old World continents? I'm not the one to research it, but a correlation between Am-Indian oral lore and this geno-map could make for an interesting thesis.

My guess is that the project will show far more migration than previously expected - humans are nothing if not mobile.

josh