The Journey of Man: A Genetic OdysseyPenguin Adult, 2003 M05 29 - 288 pages Around 60,000 years ago, a man, identical to us in all important respects, walked the soil of Africa. Every man alive today is descended from him. How did he come to be father to all of us - a real-life Adam? And why do we come in such a huge variety of sizes, shapes, types and races if we all share a single prehistoric ancestor?
In this fascinating book, Spencer Wells shows how the truth about our ancestors is hidden in our genetic code, and reveals how developments in the cutting-edge science of population genetics have made it possible not just to discover where our ancestors lived (and who they may have fought, loved, learned from and influence) but to create a family tree for the whole of humanity. |
From inside the book
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... cent of the total . A further 7 per cent served to differentiate populations within a ' race ' , such as the Greeks from the Swedes . Only 8 per cent were found to differentiate between human races . A startling conclusion- and clear ...
... cent to 70 per cent in a single generation – a pretty rapid change . Clearly , drift can have a huge effect on gene frequencies in small populations . The combination of these three forces has produced the dizzying array of genetic ...
... cent or more of the mitochondrial types in India , and close to 100 per cent of those in Australia . Quintana - Murci estimates its age to be 50-60,000 years , and from its distribution it seems that people who carried the M lineage ...