DNA Ties Together Scattered Peoples

LA Times ^ | 9-11-2006 | Steve Chawkins

[blam]

DNA Ties Together Scattered Peoples

Data on descendants of the Chumash spur new ideas about the first settlers of the Americas.

By Steve Chawkins, Times Staff Writer
September 11, 2006

Over the years, a couple of dozen descendants of the Chumash Indians have complied with the odd requests of their old friend John Johnson, a leading scholar of the tribe's culture and head of the anthropology department at the Santa Barbara Museum of Natural History. After all, what harm could come from parting with a few of their hairs or letting him swab the inside of their cheeks for a saliva sample?

What emerged from Johnson's DNA studies are tantalizing clues that link some of today's Chumash with settlers of coastal regions from Alaska to Tierra del Fuego more than 10,000 years ago.

"It's mind-boggling," said Ernestine De Soto, a 68-year-old nurse whose rare strain of DNA matches that found in ancient remains thousands of miles from the Santa Barbara area, where her family has lived for centuries. "I've always known I was Chumash, but this is something else."

Johnson's work, along with studies by archeologists and geneticists nationwide, adds more strong evidence to a theory that challenges long-held assumptions about when and how the first Americans arrived.

Ever since it was articulated by a 16th century Spanish missionary to South America, the prevailing theory has been that the first inhabitants of the Americas were big-game hunters who crossed a 1,000-mile land bridge from Asia, slogging down into the Great Plains through an inland corridor created by receding glaciers.

A number of scientists believe some may have trudged from Asia and then built boats that, over hundreds of generations, took them to spots where they put down roots along the length of the Pacific Coast.

[ASA Vet]

I shell ping nopardons to sea if she can kelp.

[blam]

"I always wondered about the folks living in the mountains of Pakistan, which exhibit European DNA. National Geographic had an issue some years ago where they followed the trail of Alexander the Great. They found these tribes which had blue eyes and some had blonde hair. They believed that they were the descendants of some of Alexander's troops which stayed behind."

Professor Stephen Oppenheimer says that (about) 50% of Europeans can trace their DNA to one man who lived in the Indus valley and who eventually made their way to Europe through the Middle East.
The other 50% (about) can trace their DNA to a son of the same man who made their way to Europe through Russia a thousand years later.

Professor Victor Mair quotes an Indian archeologist (N. Narain) in his book "The Tarim Mummies" as saying that the home land of all the Europeans is the Gansu province of China.

[blam]

Further:

I've tried to connect some of the dots on this thread:

The Presence Of Non-Chinese At Anyang

Pretty blonde headed Mongolian girl

[Doctor Stochastic]

I haven't found a map of the Aleutians giving the depth yet. However, during the latest ice age (note, I didn't say "last ice age"), the oceans were about 400 feet lower than now. Much of the continental shelf would have been exposed.

[Dustbunny]

All humans are related.

[indcons]

Ummm....okay!! Care to amplify? Are you suggesting that the DNA studies are not reliable?

[ahayes]

But you should be careful before challenging a fellow freeper with "My humble apologies. I didn't realize we were in the presence of an expert...". On these threads you just might run into such an expert. And you have.

Snerk!

Additionally sometimes popular science lags. I saw a show on Discovery a bit ago that annoyed me because it was saying the propagation of the CCR5 mutation that protects against HIV was triggered by bubonic plague. Current research (since, oh, almost a decade ago) suggests that this mutation was actually propagated because it was protective against smallpox, which was endemic in many parts of Europe for centuries.

[Dinah Lord]

Hey martin_fierro

Please add me to your ping list.

Cheers - Dinah