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Studies Find Genetic Signature of Native Australians In the Americas
Applehu Akbar writes: Two new research papers claim to have found an Australo-Melanesian DNA signal in the genetic makeup of Native Americans, dating to about the time of the last glacial maximum. This may move the speculation around the Clovis people and Kennewick man to an entirely new level. Let's hope that it at least shakes loose some more funding for North American archaeology. Ars reports: "The exact process by which humanity introduced itself to the Americas has always been controversial. While there's general agreement on the most important migration—across the Bering land bridge at the end of the last ice age—there's a lot of arguing over the details. Now, two new papers clarify some of the bigger picture but also introduce a new wrinkle: there's DNA from the distant Pacific floating around in the genomes of Native Americans. And the two groups disagree about how it got there."
The first H1B
The ad: "Wanted: fisherman, brewer, chicken farmer, corn farmer, weaver, arrow-point maker, haruspicist, spail chekker, and juggler. C++ a plus (no pun intended). Must not have a family to distract you, can work long hours without complaining, and at 20% below prevailing wages. And won't rat-fink on us to the local labor board."
Table-ized A.I.
Because archaeology is not a high-cost science, we could do a lot of basic research for not much money. It just takes a focusing of interest, raised by questions like this one. My local area (rural northern Arizona) contains several hundred ruin sites, both cliff dwellings and pit houses, representing a rich culture that in approximately 1200 simply vanished. No one really knows why. It established relations sufficiently distant that red macaw feathers have been found among their trade goods. We need to do more digging.
Also, direct utility is in genetic disposition to disease showing patterns in existing populations.
Yes, but massive understatement.
It's now possible to get your entire genome sequenced for only $1,000 - by sending (e.g. FedEx) a small tube of saliva to a sequencing facility (e.g. Macrogen in Korea). In another few years, millions of people are going to have had their genomes sequenced. And people are going to be using their genome sequences to understand everything from rare genetic disorders (i.e. inherited birth defects) to the most effective treatment for their cancer.
In most cases, you're going to want to compare your own genome to a reference genome. And this comparison will be more informative if you can choose a reference that matches your whatever ancestral population(s) you are descended from.
And you're also going to want to know about pathogenic variants that may cause disease for you or your descendants. So, let's say your have an A at position 12,143,021 on chromosome 15 where most people have a T. In fact, let's say that 10 million genomes have been sequenced at that point and only 100 people share that variant. Well, maybe all those people are a little bit sick with the same symptoms that you have. But suppose you know more about the populations. Suppose you know that all those 100 people are members of a larger population of 10 million people - and that this variant is likely to occur in most of the 10 million people in that population. In that case, you can be pretty sure that the variant is benign - that it's not the cause of your symptoms.
Clinical genome sequencing is going to be one of the biggest revolutions in the history of medicine - right up there with aseptic surgery and antibiotics. And understanding how human genetic variation is distributed across populations is going to be key to interpreting these genomes.