Deep Ancestry: Inside the Genographic Project

After hearing a lecture by Spencer Wells on the Genographic Project, I obtained a test kit to have my DNA analyzed. I now know the haplogroup for my y-chromosome, E3b (M35). If you are a male, you can get both your y-chromosome (male ancestry) and your mitochondrial DNA or mtDNA (female ancestry) mapped, but for the Genographic Project you have to get a separate DNA kit for each. Females can have only their mtDNA analyzed. My earliest male ancestors appeared in the Middle East 20,000 years ago. They hung around there for 10,000 years. While others were up north chasing mammoths in the snow, my ancestors were inventing stuff to make life easier: writing, agriculture, civilization. (It will be interesting to see how that last idea works out.) At the end of the ice age, 10,000 years ago, they moved a few hundred miles north to the Mediterranean where they can still be found today. Couch potatoes compared to many other groups. Wells' book explains how the Genographic Project uses differences in genes to place people in specific genetic groups and then to map their origin and migration through history. Wells is always positive about the contributions of each group to the human family. However, he seems particularly complimentary about my slow-to-move ancestors, "Occupying a single territory required more complex social organizations, ... It spurred trade, writing, and calendars, and pioneered the rise of modern, sedentary communities and cities." This is a good book to read or use as a reference once you have had your haplogroup determined.

Ok, so there are still a lot of obvious differences that we use to identify individuals. Keep that in the back of your mind as you digest the idea that we're all mostly made up of the same genes and genetic heritage. How significant are those subtle and small differences? Having followed this topic/effort from the periphery it wasn't as profound as it may be for most. Even so, it still boggles the mind at how much we can learn by looking within ourselves. Tying the external sciences together with the biological and statistical sciences of genographic project results in an interesting read. About a third of the book is left to appendices, etc so it left a little to be desired when I got 3/4's of the way through only to discover that I was finished. Thumbing through the appendices was interesting, but I'd rather have had all those pages applied to more analysis or commentary and give me a web page link to go look up the appendices. The book doesn't expand much on the idea of how the genetic Adam and Eve have different ages, a brief explanation and then moving on... I also felt like the idea of the genegraphic project has made a lot of politically correct (racial?) compromises in order to get their samples. The flip side is that they did get their samples so political expediency may have been the call of the day. There is still a long, long way to go to gather enough genetic samples to fill in and bolster the genetic picture they've begun to piece together, but this book is certainly a nice primer on the concept of tracking our ancestral migrations through our genes. If I could do it over again, then I'd buy this book again.

The human diaspora from Africa that populated the world has been the subject of several recent studies. At first, these books were bulwarks against the tide of "Multi-regionalism" - the idea that an early version of our ancestral species evolved into Homo sapiens at different times and places. Genetic research, including that of the author, has shown that we're all descended from a small African population. Placing our origins on one continent simplifies the task of analysis of tracking our movements. In this book, Wells explains how the examination works and what it reveals of our ancestry. The tool is "markers" on the genome. For females it was the DNA in mitochondria, the cell's "powerhouse". For males, it is changes on the Y chromosome, that molecular structure triggering a shift from the default embryo condition. The author demonstrates how these indicators are detected and how they allow us to track our ancestry back in time. The markers designate genetic "borders" between groups of people who share a common ancestor in the deep past. The groups are called "haplotypes" - for which Wells, at least in the case of Europe, uses the term "clan". There are seven of these clans - designated by letter labels such as "R", "J" or "N" - descended from male originators. The approach is reminiscent of Bryan Sykes "Seven Daughters of Eve" [2001], except Wells follows the male lineage where Sykes used mitochondrial DNA to source female origins. Both authors focus on the European records as being more complete and readily available. Wells also finds but five female lines as opposed to Sykes' seven. Wells discusses how genetic "clocks" can postulate a rate of mutation over a long span of time to roughly determine the age of the haplogroup. Much of this assessment is sustained by archaeological record. The procedures pinpoint his own grandmother's ancestry, which is ostensibly Danish, to origins in the Middle East, some ten thousand years ago at the beginning of the adoption of agriculture. The shift to the Middle East leads Wells to examine people living today with roots in far corners of the world. One notable example is "Phil", whose Native American background becomes the start of a study of Siberian people. There have been many disputes about the origins of the Western Hemisphere's human settlers. Wells travelled to the Asian North to recover genetic data. The information clearly defines the link between Indian populations here and their ancestry in Eastern Asia. Wells puts some effort into explaining how DNA works, what counts as a "mutation" and how these changes can be tracked down the generations. With enough samples from living populations in historically stable circumstances, he can provide maps of the distribution of the haplogroups and frequency of the haplotype in a given area. Ireland, for example, is populated almost exclusively by a single haplotype. He explains that The Genographic Project he heads is keen to colle

What a marvellous little book! I was taken by surprise so many times during my reading, whenever I thought I knew what the author is about at the beginning of many of his stories. In a way, this is like a crime fiction book written by a clever writer that catches you off guard and it reveals the killer only at the last page. The writing style is deceivingly simple; Spencer gets over the scientific details of genetics in a few paragraphs where he tells you in plain English everything you need to know to understand this book. The book then flows smoothly and he managed to make it so easy for you to follow the main ideas and try to decipher what is probably the greatest puzzle of all: the origins of human race. You will have a few surprises. You might have seen the National Geographic documentary "The Journey of Man". Its author is none other than same Spence Wells. He is only 37 years old, and very, very bright. I have to emphasize again the writing style: very simple, yet it explains clearly complex concepts. He talks science, yet he is humorous and light. He uses sometimes numbers and probabilities, but the book is in general built around stories of five people chosen to represent the main haplogroups (families or a clans of people that share the same genetic properties transmitted over many generations) in the history of mankind. Spencer Wells is currently a National Geographic Explorer-in-Residence and the director of Genographic Project. It is a great and fascinating role he is playing. The goal of this project is to collect about 100,000 genetic samples from people around the world that live in still pristine conditions: that is they live in the same area their families lived for a long time. This information is stored in a database and by applying sophisticated algorithms; we should be able to determine how we have evolved in time, how we migrated and how we came to become the people of today. I was a little bit sceptical about this entire concept, but the book convinced me. You will have to read it to understand what really means. It is a powerful idea. The book is based on five stories told people with very different backgrounds. Each story will astound you. You will also have a better understanding of what genetic archaeology is. If you are familiar with DNA, it will make even more sense to you. The DNA is seen more and more like a cryptic library that holds many secrets about our evolution. Segments of code will reveal relationships never thought possible. This book does not go that much in detail, but it does tell you the story in a nicely narrated style that takes you step by step through the various haplogroups patterns, like a detective, and come up with unexpected conclusions. In the end you will see why scientists believe that the Adam and Eve, the original parents of all the people that populated this planet today, lived around 60,000 years ago in Africa. If you take the time to think about it, you realise how amazing thi

The Genographic Project is an ambitious attempt to analyze the DNA records of human beings from around the world. As a participant in the Project, I already knew a bit about the basic levels of DNA research and its applications. Deep Ancestry provides a good grounding for people like me who understand a bit and want to know more about the subject, and also for those who have not yet become involved. Spencer Wells writes well and has a gift for using personal vignettes to illustrate important points. This is especially useful in describing a field as unfamiliar as DNA research for most people. Many who read Deep Ancestry will be inspired to delve deeper, in which case I would recommend other works by Wells and also those of Bryan Sykes.