Is Europe One Big Family?
Research has been done in order to study the genetic relatedness of European people. It was found that people from the U.K. and Turkey shared a large amount of genetic material. Researchers Peter Ralph and Graham Coop used the genomic data of 2,257 Europeans to represent the continent as a whole. In another study DNA was collected from ancient skeletons and it was discovered that people that these class of DNA came from immigrants that were responsible for the genetic makeup of what we know is Europe today. Ralph and Coop as well as other scientists involved in such studies confirmed that each and every individual on this planet is genetically related, even if it is an extremely small percentage. They did, however, note that the ancestry between different types of Europeans was not equally shared.
The article brings into focus that although all of Europe shares similar genetic material, people classify themselves as different and often hold their own prejudices. Besides their genetic relatedness their views on a different population would not change, and therefore cause people to be skeptical about the results of the research despite the evidence given. In all, I feel that this research has shown that although different nationalities appear to look extremely different from each other and have select features that are common within that nationality, looking at one's raw DNA proves that human beings have a common ancestor. This research serves as further evidence on evolution and how mankind evolved from a common ancestor.
Primary Article: http://rendezvous.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/05/08/genetics-reveal-europe-is-one-big-family/
Secondary Article: http://news.ucdavis.edu/search/news_detail.lasso?id=10557
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