Free Republic

Scientists analyzed more than 2,700 modern Indian genomes from 17 states, including DNA from individuals from most geographic regions, speakers of all major languages, tribal and caste groups.They revealed that one of the three main ancestral groups in India — ancient Iranian farmers — can be traced back to a group of agricultural farmers from Sarazm in modern-day Tajikistan. They also uncovered the extraordinary diversity of DNA inherited from Neanderthals and Denisovans, the closest, now-extinct relatives of modern humans.Additionally, the team found that most of the genetic variation within the current Indian population stems from a single, major migration event...

In a strange turn of events, the useful idiots that are progressive Democrats may finally give us exactly what we need to put the whole “reparations” movement to bed; here’s the story, from a report by Ben Kew and out yesterday at RedState:California lawmakers are moving to create a "genealogy office" that would help determine an individual's eligibility for reparations.…While previous proposals indicated that they might be willing to hand out checks to anyone who merely identifies as black, lawmakers are now seeking to create an agency that would help assess eligibility. This would presumably involve testing the DNA of...

SYDNEY (Reuters) - It was a great legend while it lasted, but DNA testing has finally ended a century-old story of the Hawaiian arrow carved from the bone of British explorer Captain James Cook who died in the Sandwich Islands in 1779. "There is no Cook in the Australian Museum," museum collection manager Jude Philp said on Thursday in announcing the DNA evidence that the arrow was not made from Cook's bone. But that will not stop the museum from continuing to display the arrow in its exhibition, "Uncovered: Treasures of the Australian Museum," which does include a feather cape...

They remain one of the most elusive groups of humans to have walked on earth. Evidence from the DNA traces left by Denisovans shows they lived on the Tibetan plateau, ­probably ­travelled to the Philippines and Laos in south Asia and might have made their way to northern China more than 100,000 years ago. They also interbred with modern humans...Their DNA, which was first found in samples from the Denisova cave in Siberia in 2010, provides most of our ­information about their existence.But recently scientists have pinpointed a strong candidate for the species to which the Denisovans might have belonged....

Nations of the Blackfoot Confederacy have long fought to maintain control over their land and water. Oral traditions and archaeological evidence indicate the Blackfoot Indigenous peoples and their ancestors have inhabited a broad swatch of North America more than 10,000 years.A study published today in Science Advances reinforces that connection. Genetic data confirm modern Blackfoot people are closely related to those who lived on the land hundreds of years ago. The findings also suggest Blackfoot people descend from a previously unknown genetic lineage extending back roughly 18,000 years ago, when people first populated the Americas—evidence that could bolster their claims...

The neo-Nazi who inspired Edward Norton’s skinhead character in “American History X” has revealed he is now an observant Jew after turning his life around — and discovering his heritage through DNA testing. Frank Meeink, 48, became a leader of a violent ultra-right group in the early 1990s, torturing enemies who stood in the way of his attempt to foment a race war. Intensely anti-semitic and flaunting a flaming swastika tattooed on his neck, he railed against what he called the “Zionist occupation government” and believed the Jews were “the root of all evil.”

At the start of the week of the Summer Solstice, many will once again marvel at the magnificent structures built across Ireland thousands of years ago, including Newgrange in Co Meath. The structures were built by the descendants of the first peoples that landed on the island in what is believed to be two migratory waves from around 10,000 years ago. Until recently it was argued that much of the population of Ireland was descended from this group of people, mainly from what is now Spain and southern France, with the arrival of the Celts around 500 BC adding what...

Tails are useful in many ways, but — unlike these vervet monkeys pictured in Lake Mburo National Park in Uganda — humans' closest primate relatives lost the appendages about 25 million years ago. (Photo credit: imageBROKER/Shutterstock via CNN Newsource) ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Humans have many wonderful qualities, but we lack something that’s a common feature among most animals with backbones: a tail. Exactly why that is has been something of a mystery. Tails are useful for balance, propulsion, communication and defense against biting insects. However, humans and our closest primate relatives — the great apes — said farewell to tails about 25...

Experts have long thought that the human brain is one of the first organs to rot and decompose after we die, but new research suggests that is not the case. And in fact, it turns out that brains preserve quite well, according to a team of scientists at Oxford University - though they don't know how nearly a third of the brains lasted as long as they have. Until now, any time archaeologists found an old, well-preserved brain, it was regarded as something of an oddity - or at least the product of intentional preservation efforts by ancient people.

Emerging clues may shine a new light on Hollywood’s darkest tale: the shocking 1947 death of Elizabeth Short. On January 15, 1947, an aspiring 22-year-old actress named Elizabeth Short was found brutally murdered in a vacant lot near Leimert Park in Los Angeles, California, her nude, posed body cut in half and severely mutilated. “It was pretty gruesome,” Brian Carr, a detective with the Los Angeles Police Department who worked on Short’s case, later said. It was an understatement; Short’s killer had also drained her corpse of blood and scrubbed it clean. “I just can’t imagine someone doing that to...

In December 1980, the remains of an unidentified man were discovered in Pomona Park, a city in Putnam County, Florida. During a routine patrol, a deputy found the body of a partially-buried individual near Sisco Road and Broward Lake Roan. It was determined that the remains were that of a male estimated to be 5' 6" tall and approximately 160 pounds. The man died from a gunshot wound to the neck about two to three weeks before his body was discovered. The man had no identification on him and through interviews it was believed that he was a migrant worker....

A century-old science mystery has been solved, according to scientists who say recent studies involving mutation revealed the molecular mechanism behind a previously unresolved biological pattern involving chromosomes. Each individual organism that is the product of sexual reproduction bears qualities that resemble its parents, as well as its siblings. Despite these similarities, no two organisms are identical, thanks in part to the process of meiosis. Meiosis is what happens as cells undergo division, resulting in the production of four “daughter” cells that each possess only half the number of chromosomes as the parent. Genetic information is exchanged during this initial...

Stone tools unearthed in a quarry in [southwest] Ukraine belonged to ancient humans...The researchers determined they were 1.4 million years old...No human fossils have been found at the open-air site...the study suggested it would have been Homo Erectus...The earliest human fossils unearthed in Europe are from...Spain and date back 1.1 million years...In Georgia [Caucasus], human fossils found near Dmanisi are thought to be 1.8 million years old.

A South African anthropologist has asked permission to open the graves of William Shakespeare and his family to determine, among other things, what killed the Bard and whether his poems and plays may have been composed under the influence of marijuana. But while Shakespeare's skeleton could reveal clues about his health and death, the question of the man's drug use depends on the presence of hair, fingernails or toenails in the grave, said Francis Thackeray, the director of the Institute for Human Evolution at the University of Witwatersrand in Johannesburg, who floated the proposal to the Church of England. Thackeray...

As the UN commemorates World Day of Social Justice on February 20, we’re taking a look at one of the key challenges the world is facing in the coming decades: the gradual and largely irreversible shift towards an older population. According to the United Nations Population Division, the number of persons aged 65 and older is expected to double over the next three decades, reaching 1.6 billion in 2050. As the following chart shows, Asia is at the forefront of this trend, with Hong Kong, South Korea and Japan expected to have the highest share of people aged 65 and...

The consumer genome sequencing company 23andMe is a sinking ship – and its CEO is conducting the orchestra. As Wired reports, 23andMe CEO Anne Wojcicki was chipper on a February 7 earnings call despite the company's abysmal revenue report that led to its stock being devalued to below 75 cents per share, down a whopping 93 percent from the $16.04 when it first went public. "We are an unusual company," Wojcicki said, per Wired, during the investor call. That response very much undersells the circumstances that may lead to 23andMe spinning off its consumer DNA testing and therapeutics wings into...

The rise of farming in late Stone Age Europe was no smooth transition from hunter-gatherer lifestyles but a bloody takeover that saw nomadic populations wiped out by farmer-settlers in a few generations, a new study has found.In fact, twice in just a thousand years, the population of southern Scandinavia was entirely replaced by newcomers to the area, whose remains bear next to no trace of their predecessors in DNA profiles, analyzed by an international team of researchers."This transition has previously been presented as peaceful," explains study author and palaeoecologist Anne Birgitte Nielsen of Lund University...Using a technique called shotgun sequencing,...

A portrait of Beethoven painted in 1820 by Karl Joseph Stieler. (Karl Joseph Stieler/PD) ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ One stormy Monday in March, 1827, the German composer Ludwig van Beethoven passed away after a protracted illness. Bedridden since the previous Christmas, he was attacked by jaundice, his limbs and abdomen swollen, each breath a struggle. As his associates went about the task of sorting through personal belongings, they uncovered a document Beethoven had written a quarter of a century earlier – a will beseeching his brothers make details of his condition known to the public. Today it is no secret that one of...

In an episode of “The Sopranos”, a popular television series which started airing in the 1990s, a gangster tells Tony, from the titular family, that he wants to retire. “What are you, a hockey player?” Tony snaps back. Non-fictional non-criminals who are considering an end to their working lives need not worry about broken fingers or other bodily harm. But they must still contend with other potentially painful losses: of income, purpose or, most poignantly, relevance. Some simply won’t quit. Giorgio Armani refuses to relinquish his role as chief executive of his fashion house at the age of 89. Being...

In autumn 2023, a hacker called Golem posted on a well-known message board for cybercriminals, announcing a trove of data stolen from 23andMe, one of the biggest names in at-home DNA testing. Golem boasted about having access to the accounts of people of Ashkenazi Jewish heritage who had sent their DNA to 23andMe, and offered to sell it to whoever was prepared to pay. "tailored ethnic groupings, individualized data sets, pinpointed origin estimations, haplogroup details, phenotype information, photographs, links to hundreds of potential relatives, and, most crucially, raw data profiles". The purported ability of Jews to blend in – to...