Free Republic

A groundbreaking new collaboration is working to resurrect one of New Zealand’s most enigmatic lost species, the South Island Giant Moa. Blending ancient knowledge with cutting-edge science, the cooperative initiative has been launched between the Ngāi Tahu Research Centre in collaboration with U.S.-based biotech firm Colossal Biosciences and filmmaker Sir Peter Jackson. The initiative seeks to place indigenous values and ecological restoration at the forefront of de-extinction science, representing a historic development in conservation biology. The collaboration marks the first time that an indigenous-led research team will direct a de-extinction initiative of this scale. Based at the University of Canterbury,...

The University of PennsylvaniaSarah Tishkoff, professor in the departments of genetics and biology at University of Pennsylvania, is collecting samples in Africa. Collaboration by University of Pennsylvania and Cornell University PHILADELPHIA –- People who identify as African-American may be as little as 1 percent West African or as much as 99 percent, just one finding of a large-scale, genome-wide study of African and African-American ancestry released today. An international research team led by scientists from the University of Pennsylvania and Cornell University has collected and analyzed genotype data from 365 African-Americans, 203 people from 12 West African populations and...

According to the Academy of Athens, scientists decoded the DNA of the famous Greek feta cheese. Recently, scientists from the Biomedical Research Foundation of the Academy of Athens studied a wide variety of feta cheese produced all across the nation of Greece in an effort to quantify the nutritional specifics of the popular Greek cheese. According to findings, feta cheese has 489 different types of protein, making it one of the most protein-rich cheese varieties in the entire world. Feta cheese is a white cheese produced in Greece and made of sheep’s milk, but it can also be made from...

The strangeness began when a research boat known as the Blue Heron started experiencing mechanical difficulties during a trip to Lake Erie and was dry-docked for repairs. While investigating the issue, Captain Rual Lee discovered a strange thick, black tar-like substance that seemed to be oozing out of the rudder. Unable to determine what it was, he sent a sample to the University of Minnesota Duluth. When researchers analyzed the substance, they discovered that it contained 20 DNA sequences and while many could be identified, several were completely novel and unknown to science. They concluded that the substance - now...

A new study reveals a long-isolated North African human lineage in the Central Sahara during the African humid period more than 7,000 years ago To the point DNA analysis from two naturally mummified individuals from Libya: More than 7,000 years ago, during the so-called African Humid Period (Green Sahara), a long isolated human lineage existed in North Africa. Limited gene flow: The genomes do not carry sub-Saharan African ancestry, suggesting that, contrary to previous interpretations, the Green Sahara was not a migration corridor between Northern and Sub-Saharan Africa. The spread of migratory herding in the Green Sahara probably occurred through...

The genetically modified “dire wolves” created by Colossal Biosciences have hit a major milestone: they’re now six months old, and their growth is nothing short of remarkable. These animals, Romulus, Remus, and Khaleesi, are part of a groundbreaking project aimed at resurrecting features of an ancient species that roamed Earth thousands of years ago. A Rapid Growth Surge At just six months old, Romulus and Remus, the older siblings of the trio, now weigh over 40 kilograms (around 90 pounds), nearly 20% heavier than a typical gray wolf. These shaggy cubs are becoming the living embodiment of the extinct dire...

A 92-year-old man has been found guilty of the rape and murder of a Bristol woman in a case that remained unsolved for nearly six decades. Louisa Dunne, 75, was found strangled on her living room floor by a neighbour on Britannia Road in Easton, Bristol, on 28 June 1967. Convicted rapist Ryland Headley, of Clarence Road in Ipswich, has now been found guilty of Mrs Dunne's murder following a trial at Bristol Crown Court. Senior investigating officer Det Insp Dave Marchant said Headley, who was in his 30s when he killed Mrs Dunne, had left "a legacy of misery...

Yeah forgive me if I feel a creeping sense of dread and foreboding about this one. From a UK non-profit called "Wellcome": Wellcome is providing £10 million funding to the new Synthetic Human Genome Project (SynHG) to develop the foundational tools, technology and methods to enable researchers to one day synthesise genomes. Building a full synthetic human genome is expected to take decades. Over the next five years, the SynHG project will build the foundational tools to enable this work. The "ability to synthesize large genomes, including genomes for human cells, may transform our understanding of genome biology and profoundly...

Newgrange sits in Ireland's Boyne Valley, about 30 miles north of Dublin. Built around 3200 B.C., this massive stone monument features a long passage leading to a central chamber, all covered by a circular mound of earth and stones. For over 300 years, treasure hunters and antiquarians ransacked the site, making it nearly impossible to know exactly where artifacts originally came from.This historical looting creates a major problem for the "king" theory. The skull fragment NG10 was found during proper archaeological excavations in the 1960s, but researchers can't definitively say it was originally placed in the tomb's supposedly "prestigious" right-hand...

Scholars have long debated the origins of the House of Piast, Poland's first royal dynasty, who ruled the nation from the tenth through the fourteenth century. Some believe they were Slavic nobles, others Moravian exiles, and still others say they were Viking warriors. The Conversation reports on new DNA analysis that has revealed shocking new information concerning the Piasts' genetic background that might potentially rewrite history. Researchers led by molecular biologist Marek Figlerowicz of Poznań University of Technology extracted DNA from 33 individuals, 30 men and three women, belonging to the Piast dynasty. Most of the deceased, who lived between...

A new genome mapping model uncovered 62 key trait loci in bananas, overcoming chromosomal barriers and aiding future crop improvement across complex plant genomes. Bananas are a dietary staple for millions of people, but their cultivation faces serious threats due to limited genetic diversity and significant breeding challenges. In a major scientific breakthrough, researchers examined more than 2,700 triploid banana hybrids to uncover the genetic basis of 24 important traits related to yield, plant structure, and fruit quality. By using a high-resolution SNP dataset along with an adapted genome-wide association study (GWAS) model, the team identified 62 genomic regions associated...

Walk in the footsteps of the Scythian Princes who lived in the 1st millennium AD. This mysterious people of intrepid horsemen has left a real archaeological desire. From the 1st millennium BC, the Scythians constituted a moving and formidable empire established in the vast Eurasian steppes. The only traces they left us are their graves: the kurgans. In April 1999, a Franco-Italian and Kazakh scientific team announced the exceptional discovery in Kazakhstan of a 2,400-year-old Scythian tomb. A true archaeological treasure, the contents of the tomb reveal, among other things, twelve horses entirely harnessed in gold, whose precious adornment testifies...

A recent study published last year in the journal Cell has identified the ancient origins of a genetic mutation that confers resistance to HIV, and how it first appeared in an individual who lived near the Black Sea between 6,700 and 9,000 years ago. Named CCR5 delta 32, the uncommon genetic variant disables a key immune protein used by a large majority of strains of the HIV virus to enter human cells and therefore "locks out" the virus in individuals who carry two copies of the mutation.HIV is a relatively new disease. It was only identified in the last century,...

Social control within spotties goes hand in hand with the overall body size. A female spotty/paketi (an endemic species of wrasse) in the Gemmell Lab at the University of Otago. - Gemmell Lab ========================================================================= Researchers at the University of Otago have discovered that the New Zealand spotty fish, or paketi, can begin displaying dominant behaviors just minutes after a shift in their social order, well before their bodies begin changing sex. The study highlights how quickly social hierarchies can influence this remarkable species’ behavior and even biological transitions. “The aggressive behaviors (called ‘rushes’) involved the dominant fish swimming rapidly towards...

Among the most surprising finds is that the inhabitants of the earliest cities of the Bronze Age (3500–1200 b.c.) were enthusiastic pig eaters, and that even later Iron Age (1200–586 b.c.) residents of Jerusalem enjoyed the occasional pork feast. Yet despite a wealth of data and new techniques including ancient DNA analysis, archaeologists still wrestle with many porcine mysteries, including why the once plentiful animal gradually became scarce long before religious taboos were enacted...In the 1990s, at the site of Hallan Çemi in southeastern Anatolia, archaeologists unearthed 51,000 animal bones dating to about 10,000 b.c. Of these, boar bones made...

Matthew's dad had brown eyes and black hair. His grandparents had piercing blue eyes. There was a running joke in his family that "dad looked nothing like his parents", the teacher from southern England says. It turned out there was a very good reason for this. Matthew's father had been swapped at birth in hospital nearly 80 years ago. He died late last year before learning the truth of his family history. Matthew - not his real name - contacted the BBC after we reported on the case of Susan, who received compensation from an NHS trust after a home...

Scientists were recently baffled by DNA evidence that revealed the existence of a genetically unknown group of early South American settlers. Archaeologists are continually adapting their models for how human populations spread from Asia through North America to South America, and this new research is bound to alter those theories once again. The Associated Press reports that the researchers analyzed ancient DNA from 21 individuals who lived in Colombia's Altiplano Cundiboyacense region thousands of years ago. Located near current-day Bogotá, this area was also close to the ancient land bridge connecting South and Central America, the route that early human...

A new round of DNA testing exonerates a homeless man who has spent nearly four decades in prison for the killing of a Santa Ana nanny, according to defense attorneys who are asking Orange County District Attorney Todd Spitzer to declare Kenneth Clair innocent of the 1984 slaying. Clair, who spent years on death row before an appellate court overturned his death sentence and he was re-sentenced to life without the possibility of parole. ...

Evidence of human violence towards other humans during the Paleolithic period is rarely seen in the archaeological record. According to a Live Science report, however, one such case occurred around 17,000 years ago in what is today northern Italy. In 1973, archaeologists uncovered in the Riparo Tagliente rock shelter the partial skeletal remains of a man, known as Tagliente 1, who they determined had died in his 20s.Although the reasons were not readily apparent at the time, recent reanalysis of his bones suggests he may have been the victim of a bloody ambush. Electron microscope scanning and 3D imaging revealed...

A statement released by KU Leuven revealed that Belgian geneticists and their international colleagues conducted the largest-ever DNA study of remains from a medieval cemetery.In 2019, excavations beneath the main square in Sint-Truiden uncovered 3,000 skeletons buried in a former parish graveyard between the eighth and the eighteenth century. The researchers analyzed the remains of 400 of those individuals, which has provided unprecedented new information about the genetic history of the Low Countries.One of the most surprising results was that in the early Middle Ages, the population of Sint-Truiden was far more genetically diverse than in later periods. The scientists...