that explains it! no wonder i can't get enough of broads

Indian DNA links to 6 'founding mothers'

By MALCOLM RITTER, AP Science Writer

Nearly all of today's Native Americans in North, Central and South America can trace part of their ancestry to six women whose descendants immigrated around 20,000 years ago, a DNA study suggests.

Those women left a particular DNA legacy that persists to today in about about 95 percent of Native Americans, researchers said.

The finding does not mean that only these six women gave rise to the migrants who crossed into North America from Asia in the initial populating of the continent, said study co-author Ugo Perego.

The women lived between 18,000 and 21,000 years ago, though not necessarily at exactly the same time, he said.

The work was published this week by the journal PLoS One. Perego is from the Sorenson Molecular Genealogy Foundation in Salt Lake City and the University of Pavia in Italy.

The work confirms previous indications of the six maternal lineages, he said. But an expert unconnected with the study said the findings left some questions unanswered.

Perego and his colleagues traced the history of a particular kind of DNA that represents just a tiny fraction of the human genetic material, and reflects only a piece of a person's ancestry.

This DNA is found in the mitochondria, the power plants of cells. Unlike the DNA found in the nucleus, mitochondrial DNA is passed along only by the mother. So it follows a lineage that connects a person to his or her mother, then the mother's mother, and so on.

The researchers created a "family tree" that traces the different mitochondrial DNA lineages found in today's Native Americans. By noting mutations in each branch and applying a formula for how often such mutations arise, they calculated how old each branch was. That indicated when each branch arose in a single woman.

The six "founding mothers" apparently did not live in Asia because the DNA signatures they left behind aren't found there, Perego said. They probably lived in Beringia, the now-submerged land bridge that stetched to North America, he said.

Connie Mulligan of the University of Florida, an anthropolgist who studies the colonization of the Americas but didn't participate in the new work, said it's not surprising to trace the mitochondrial DNA to six women. "It's an OK number to start with right now," but further work may change it slightly, she said.

That finding doesn't answer the bigger questions of where those women lived, or of how many people left Beringia to colonize the Americas, she said Thursday.

The estimate for when the women lived is open to question because it's not clear whether the researchers properly accounted for differing mutation rates in mitochondrial DNA, she said. Further work could change the estimate, "possibly dramatically," she said.

By elmodefoque on Mar 13, 2008, 12:00 in Friendly Talkzone.

elmodefoque says on Mar 13, 2008, 12:01:

thank you!

over 5 million colombianos in USA and only 27 barranquilleros, i'm one.Curramba, el mejor vividero del mundo!

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Mr. Hollywood says on Mar 13, 2008, 12:14:

Elmo, I was just thinking about you while reading about Elliot Spitzer's fall from grace. WTF do you think a guy gets for $3,000 an hour from a hooker? That better be some damn good service.

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elmodefoque says on Mar 13, 2008, 12:19:

for $3,000 i want her chiquito with icecream on top.
i also wanna give her a golden shower and.............

over 5 million colombianos in USA and only 27 barranquilleros, i'm one.Curramba, el mejor vividero del mundo!

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Mr. Hollywood says on Mar 13, 2008, 12:20:

I hear you, hermano.

Somehow I'm guessing the ex-governor didn't even get that much.

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El Polo says on Mar 13, 2008, 12:21:

LMAO no joda Elmo

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elmodefoque says on Mar 13, 2008, 12:24:

nojodaaaa 3 mil barras (USA) por un polvo. LA MEO!!!

over 5 million colombianos in USA and only 27 barranquilleros, i'm one.Curramba, el mejor vividero del mundo!

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El Polo says on Mar 13, 2008, 12:26:

$4,300 compa

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El Polo says on Mar 13, 2008, 12:29:

Thats way too much, for that price el chiquito, hagen daz plus a golden shower is in order. They should give Spizter a piss test too WTF was he thinking???

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elmodefoque says on Mar 13, 2008, 12:31:

as for the great governor Eliot "client #6" Spitzer, i don't blame him on bit.
NO NORMAL GUY, I REPEAT, NO NORMAL MAN is happy with the same woman for 20 years, day after day, week after week, month after month, year after long agonzing years. 6 months is the max.
thank you!

over 5 million colombianos in USA and only 27 barranquilleros, i'm one.Curramba, el mejor vividero del mundo!

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El Polo says on Mar 13, 2008, 12:47:

http://www.nydailynews.com/news/galleries/eliot_spitzers_kristen/eliot...

El man metio la pata pagando $4,300 american barras and getting caught. jeje

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El Polo says on Mar 13, 2008, 12:48:

what happen to the thread?

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