Humans have the dubious distinction of being host to three separate species of louse. The head louse, Pediculus humanus, or its direct ancestor has been with us for the longest ride, probably for the entire 12-13 millions of years that primates and head lice have existed. The body louse (also known as the clothing louse) and the pubic louse that prefers that coarser hair for its home developed or hopped aboard later.
The New York Times reported that David L Reed of the University of Florida has been poking around with the DNA of human lice and the lice of other primates and monkeys, and has found some intriguing clues to human development. He has specialized in using the clues in the DNA of host specific parasites to mark the changes in the host behavior or development. (more…)

Recent reports of God’s love for gambling with cosmic rays and free radicals, along with her relentless smiting of inefficiency gives new evidence for evolution. Michael Archangel from the Seraphim Institute reports new research showing the completely random nature of cosmic ray DNA adjustment , and breakage of base pair bonds by free radical interaction. The direct result of these random events is the first driving force of the process called evolution – the random variation of DNA coding.

The second process, natural selection, is driven by God’s policy of smiting inefficiency. The smiting is effected largely through her agents – predators, starvation, parasites, changes in environment and competition. (more…)

Bryan Sykes is a pioneer in researching mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA). That is the little extra bits of DNA that are included in mammal cells not within the nucleus. The DNA in the mitochondria is passed down only on the female line, as they are not part of the recombination in sexual reproduction, but are included as part of the egg. Like the amoeba, the mitochondrial DNA only changes due to mutation.

Professor Sykes determined that the 500 base pairs of “junk” mitochondrial DNA mutates slowly and at a pretty constant rate, so he figured that by comparing the “junk” bits of DNA he could figure out if your mother’s mother’s mother’s mother is the same as mine. Well surprisingly enough, those of us of European decent have only seven mitochondrial mothers, and from anywhere in the world only thirty three.

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