Posted by:
SL Cabbie
(
)
Date: March 02, 2012 12:41AM
This assertion taken from the article is nonsense (the 8000 year-old skeletons were from a "wet site" in Florida known as the Windover Bog):
>Scientific tests on ancient DNA extracted from 8000 year old skeletons from Florida have revealed a high level of a key probable European-originating genetic marker.
The DNA findings were most likely the result of contamination since they couldn't be replicated.
http://public.wsu.edu/~bmkemp/publications/pubs/Kemp_et_al_2006.pdf>While Hauswirth et al [55] claimed to have isolated both nuclear and mitochondrial DNA from a number of the Windover brains, their data is suspect as the mtDNA lineages are absent in all other prehistoric and contemporary Native American populations studied to date. Repeated attempts to extract DNA from these remains using many of the techniques to remove inhibition reported above, including BSA and serial dilution have failed [52] and unpublished data Smith Lab UC Davis).
https://netfiles.uiuc.edu/malhi/www/MalhiLab/downloads/Smith%20Malhi%20Eshleman%20Kaestle%20Kemp.pdf>The characterization of one Windover sample as a member of haplogroup X is an interpretation by Smith et al. (1999) of one of eight HVS1 sequences reported by Hauswirth (1994). However, since none of the remaining seven sequences reported by Hauswirth exhibited CR sequences characteristic of any other Asian-derived haplogroup and might therefore reflect either contamination or sequencing errors, the assignment of one of those sequences to Haplogroup X was probably in error. Be-
cause haplogroup X is found in Europe at a frequency of about 3 percent, it is possible that contaminant DNA in the Windover sample was the source of this member of haplogroup X, which has otherwise not been reported from populations of southeastern North America (Malhi et al. 2001).
>Thus, assessment of haplogroup X without restriction analysis is problematic. None of the 12 Windover samples analyzed as part of the present study contained sufficient DNA for analysis.
The claim that there is no evidence for Siberian origins is equally without merit. Archaeologists may not have found it, but it is there nevertheless in Y-Chromosome and mtDNA within the inhabitants of the Altai region.
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/ajpa.21614/full>Taking into account that [Haplogroup] C4c is deeply rooted in the Asian portion of the mtDNA phylogeny and is indubitably of Asian origin, the finding that C4c and X2a are characterized by parallel genetic histories definitively dismisses the controversial hypothesis of an Atlantic glacial entry route into North America. Am J Phys Anthropol, 2012. © 2011 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.
Quite simply, if there were Solutrean or other European DNA in Native Americans, it would've turned up by now. The claim of a relationship between the "X" haplogroup found in Europe and that found in Native Americans ignores the reality that the X2a line (found only in North America) split off from the X2b line early on, doubtless much earlier even than the Solutreans.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1180497/>It is notable that X2 includes the two complete Native American X sequences that constitute the distinctive X2a clade, a clade that lacks close relatives in the entire Old World, including Siberia. The position of X2a in the phylogenetic tree suggests an early split from the other X2 clades, likely at the very beginning of their expansion and spread from the Near East.
Finally, even the linguistics claim in the article is specious:
>There are also a tiny number of isolated Native American groups whose languages appear not to be related in any way to Asian-originating American Indian peoples.
The only link--which was only discovered recently--between any Native American Languages and Siberian ones was that uncovered by Edward Vajda. To suggest that languages "appearing" is evidence of anything at all is an unwarranted stretch. Languages that are not written--and therefore "fixed"--undergo rapid evolution, particularly in isolated small and migratory populations.
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1993449/postsIt remains to be seen whether the "knife found in Virginia" and claimed to be made of French flint will withstand extensive analysis.
Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 03/02/2012 12:46AM by SL Cabbie.