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A baby boy’s eyes temporarily changed from dark brown to bright blue after receiving a common COVID-19 treatment. The six-month-old baby boy from Thailand was diagnosed with severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) infection after suffering a fever and a cough for a day, as detailed in a case published in the medical journal Frontiers in Pediatrics. The infant was prescribed favipiravir, the antiviral treatment approved by the Thai Ministry of Public Health in 2022 for children with mild-to-moderate symptoms. Shockingly, about 18 hours after beginning the medication, the mother noticed that her child’s dark brown eyes had turned...

New research shows that people with blue eyes have a single, common ancestor. Scientists have tracked down a genetic mutation which took place 6,000-10,000 years ago and is the cause of the eye color of all blue-eyed humans alive on the planet today "Originally, we all had brown eyes," said Professor Hans Eiberg from the Department of Cellular and Molecular Medicine. "But a genetic mutation affecting the OCA2 gene in our chromosomes resulted in the creation of a "switch," which literally "turned off" the ability to produce brown eyes." The OCA2 gene codes for the so-called P protein, which is...

An international team of researchers from Tel Aviv University, the Israel Antiquities Authority and Harvard University has discovered that waves of migration from Anatolia and the Zagros mountains (today's Turkey and Iran) to the Levant helped develop the Chalcolithic culture that existed in Israel's Upper Galilee region some 6,500 years ago. The study is one of the largest ancient DNA studies ever conducted in Israel and for the first time sheds light on the origins of the Chalcolithic culture in the Levant, approximately 6,000-7,000 years ago... The team unearthed dozens of burials in the natural stalactite cave that is 17...

Italy’s new government barred a migrant rescue ship from docking at its ports on Friday, in its third such refusal this month, hours after a tense meeting of European leaders over migration ended. Transport Minister Danilo Toninelli said in a statement he had received a formal request from the interior ministry, headed by far-right leader Matteo Salvini, to deny Spanish charity Proactiva Open Arms entry on the grounds that it was a danger to public order.

New research shows that all blue-eyed people share a common ancestor. This person lived more than 6,000 years ago and carried a genetic mutation that has now spread across the world. The exact cause remains to be determined but scientists do know that eye color began to change long before recorded history began. The following is a transcript of the video. All blue-eyed people have one ancestor in common, born around 6,000-10,000 years ago. Blue eyes are caused by a gene mutation. For years, researchers had searched for it on the OCA2 gene. The OCA2 gene determines how much brown...

What most people know about the inheritance of eye color is that brown comes from a dominant gene (needing one copy only) and blue from a recessive gene (needing two copies). University of Queensland geneticist Rick Sturm suggests that the genetics are not so clear. "There is no single gene for eye color," he says, "but the biggest effect is the OCA2 gene." This gene, which controls the amount of melanin pigment produced, accounts for about 74 percent of the total variation in people's eye color. Sturm has recently shown that the OCA2 gene itself is influenced by other genetic...

University of Queensland Date: February 25, 2007 No Single Gene For Eye Color, Researchers Prove Science Daily — A study by researchers from The University of Queensland's Institute for Molecular Bioscience (IMB) and the Queensland Institute of Medical Research is the first to prove conclusively that there is no single gene for eye colour. Says Dr. Rick Sturm, the IMB researcher who led the study: "... the model of eye colour inheritance using a single gene is insufficient to explain the range of eye colours that appear in humans. We believe instead that there are two major genes -- one...

Full headline: Is this the first man with blue eyes? Experts astonished that 7,000-year-old DNA reveals caveman with African and European genes Remains discovered 5000ft up mountains of north-west Spain Findings suggest racial transformation happened later than thought Man, dubbed La Brana 1, also shows similarity to Scandinavian DNA His piercing blue eyes are in striking contrast to his dark complexion and hair. It means this 7,000-year-old caveman holds the clue to man’s genetic evolution. His remains were discovered 5,000ft up in the mountains of north-west Spain in 2006. Experts were astonished to find the ancient hunter-gatherer, given the name...

The headlines about this individual having dark skin are well founded, like the Luxembourg hunter-gatherer the sample has ancestral “non-European” copies of most of the major loci which are known to have large effect sizes (SLC24A5, which is now fixed in Europeans, SLC45A2, which is present at frequencies north of 80% in most of Europe, and KITLG, a lower frequency variant known to have a major impact on skin and hair). Additionally, this individual is related to the Ma’lta individual, just like the Swedish hunter-gatherers, but unlike the Luxembourg male (which did predate the Spanish samples by 1,000 years). Lots...

Blue-eyed men prefer blue-eyed women, apparently because eye color can help reveal whether their partner has been faithful, researchers said on Monday. "Before you request a paternity test, spend a few minutes looking at your child's eye color," Bruno Laeng and colleagues at the University of Tromso in Norway said in the study. Under the laws of genetics, two parents with blue eyes will always have blue-eyed children, it said. So a blue-eyed man can know his blue-eyed wife or partner has cheated on him if their child has brown eyes. "Blue-eyed men may have unconsciously learned to value a...

... Pigmentation genes carried by the hunters and farmers showed that, while the dark hair, brown eyes and pale skin of the early farmer would look familiar to us, the hunter-gatherers would stand out if we saw them on a street today. "It really does look like the indigenous West European hunter gatherers had this striking combination of dark skin and blue eyes that doesn't exist any more," Prof Reich told BBC News.

The modern European gene pool was formed when three ancient populations mixed within the last 7,000 years, Nature journal reports. Blue-eyed, swarthy hunters mingled with brown-eyed, pale skinned farmers as the latter swept into Europe from the Near East. But another, mysterious population with Siberian affinities also contributed to the genetic landscape of the continent. The findings are based on analysis of genomes from nine ancient Europeans. Agriculture originated in the Near East - in modern Syria, Iraq and Israel - before expanding into Europe around 7,500 years ago. It really does look like the indigenous West European hunter gatherers...

The modern European gene pool was formed when three ancient populations mixed with one another within the last 7,000 years, Nature journal reports. Blue-eyed, swarthy hunters mingled with brown-eyed, pale skinned farmers as the latter swept into Europe from the Near East. But another, mysterious population with Siberian affinities also contributed to the genetic landscape of the continent. The findings are based analysis of the genomes of nine ancient Europeans. Agriculture originated in the Near East - in modern Syria, Iraq and Israel - before expanding into Europe around 7,500 years ago. Multiple lines of evidence suggested this new way...

The modern European gene pool was formed when three ancient populations mixed with one another within the last 7,000 years, Nature journal reports. Blue-eyed, swarthy hunters mingled with brown-eyed, pale skinned farmers as the latter swept into Europe from the Near East. But another, mysterious population with Siberian affinities also contributed to the genetic landscape of the continent. The findings are based analysis of the genomes of nine ancient Europeans.

Do you have blues eyes? (Lucky you!) Are you dating someone with blue eyes? (Even luckier!) You may think the eye color similarity is no different than dating with someone with a similar hair color or skin tone, but science just revealed that BOOM: All people with blue eyes are genetically linked. Thus, you and your blue-eyed hunny are both definitely related somehow - and even weirder, your shared relative can be narrowed down to one ancestor! A study at University of Copenhagen found that because blue eyes are a genetic mutation — before said mutation, everyone in the world...

I'm boycotting Brazil nuts. The top nut in Brazil, President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva (big enough to be known simply as Lula, like Beyonce or Madonna) told British Prime Minister Gordon Brown that the world's current economic crisis was caused by "white people with blue eyes." Waving his finger at Brown, Lula, a socialist, said people in poor countries shouldn't have to pay for the mistakes of people in rich countries. "It is a crisis caused and encouraged by the irrational behavior of white people with blue eyes," he said, "who before the crisis appeared to know everything, but...

“This crisis was caused by the irrational behavior of white people with blue eyes, who before the crisis appeared to know everything and now demonstrate that they know nothing,” charged the brown-eyed, bearded socialist president [Lula of Brazil]. As the brown-eyed Brown grew a whiter shade of pale, Lula hammered the obvious point that the poor of the world were suffering in the global crash because of the misdeeds of the rich. “I do not know any black or indigenous bankers,” said Lula. He also told CNN he would press this theme at the G-20 meeting in London this week....

Brazil’s President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva on Thursday blamed the global economic crisis on “white people with blue eyes” and said it was wrong that black and indigenous people should pay for white people’s mistakes. Speaking in Brasília at a joint press conference with Gordon Brown, the UK prime minister, Mr Lula da Silva told reporters: “This crisis was caused by the irrational behaviour of white people with blue eyes, who before the crisis appeared to know everything and now demonstrate that they know nothing.” He added: “I do not know any black or indigenous bankers so I can...

A Northwest Side man was charged with a hate crime and his three adult sons were charged with felony aggravated battery in an alleged attack on a motorist in which racial epithets were shouted, prosecutors said. Mahmoud Alkhazaleh, 53, of the 5500 block of North Mango Avenue also was charged with aggravated battery and vehicle invasion in a June 9 attack on a man who allegedly had honked his horn to prod Alkhazaleh to step out of the path of his truck, according to court documents. Alkhazaleh called the victim a "blue-eyed devil" and an " 'American [expletive]' during a...

People with blue eyes have a single, common ancestor, according to new research. A team of scientists has tracked down a genetic mutation that leads to blue eyes. The mutation occurred between 6,000 and 10,000 years ago, so before then, there were no blue eyes. "Originally, we all had brown eyes," said Hans Eiberg from the Department of Cellular and Molecular Medicine at the University of Copenhagen. The mutation affected the so-called OCA2 gene, which is involved in the production of melanin, the pigment that gives color to our hair, eyes and skin. "A genetic mutation affecting the OCA2 gene...