The Journey of Man: A Genetic OdysseyRandom House Trade Paperbacks, 2003 - 218 pages Around 60,000 years ago, a man—genetically identical to us—lived in Africa. Every person alive today is descended from him. How did this real-life Adam wind up as the father of us all? What happened to the descendants of other men who lived at the same time? And why, if modern humans share a single prehistoric ancestor, do we come in so many sizes, shapes, and races? Examining the hidden secrets of human evolution in our genetic code, Spencer Wells reveals how developments in the revolutionary science of population genetics have made it possible to create a family tree for the whole of humanity. Replete with marvelous anecdotes and remarkable information, from the truth about the real Adam and Eve to the way differing racial types emerged, The Journey of Man is an enthralling, epic tour through the history and development of early humankind. |
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Page 124
... analysis was almost always limited to mitochondrial DNA , present in huge numbers of copies in every cell - making it more likely that one copy would have survived the Russian roulette of molecular degradation over the centuries . It ...
... analysis was almost always limited to mitochondrial DNA , present in huge numbers of copies in every cell - making it more likely that one copy would have survived the Russian roulette of molecular degradation over the centuries . It ...
Page 138
... analysis , and the mutation rate of the single microsatellite used to assess M3 diversity ( using the same method that we used to date M173 in Europe ) was uncertain . Thus it could also have been as much as 30,000 years old . Clearly ...
... analysis , and the mutation rate of the single microsatellite used to assess M3 diversity ( using the same method that we used to date M173 in Europe ) was uncertain . Thus it could also have been as much as 30,000 years old . Clearly ...
Page 153
... analysis of these markers led Cavalli - Sforza and his colleagues to conclude that there had been a mass migration of genes out of the Middle East , and the genetic pattern was very similar to that observed for the first appearance of ...
... analysis of these markers led Cavalli - Sforza and his colleagues to conclude that there had been a mass migration of genes out of the Middle East , and the genetic pattern was very similar to that observed for the first appearance of ...
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Common terms and phrases
actually Adam Africa agriculture analysis ancient animals anthropologists apes appear Asian Australia Cavalli-Sforza cent central Asia China chromosomes clan climate coastal colleagues common ancestor continent culture Darwin defined descendants developed earliest early human east Asia Eurasian Europe Europeans evolution evolutionary expansion extinct favour frequency genes genetic data genetic diversity genetic pattern genetic variation geneticists genome hominid Homo erectus human diversity human genetic human migration human populations hunter-gatherers hunting ice age impala India Indo-European languages infer ingredients journey known last ice age leap lifestyle linguistic living marker Mediterranean Middle East Middle Eastern migration million mitochondrial DNA modern humans molecules mtDNA mutations Native Americans Neanderthals Neolithic non-African northern nucleotide origin past perhaps polymorphisms population genetics recent region route sample Siberia simply soup recipes south-east Asia southern species spoken spread steppe suggests thousands trace unique Upper Palaeolithic western Y-chromosome lineages