R1a1a conquers the world…in a few pulses?
As many of you know around the year 2000 the analyses of Y chromosomal human lineages became a pretty big deal. The reason these lineages are important and useful is that they record the uninterrupted ancestry of males, from father to son, along the Y…
Which results from cognitive psychology are robust & real?
A paper on the psychology of religious belief, Paranormal and Religious Believers Are More Prone to Illusory Face Perception than Skeptics and Non-believers, came onto my radar recently. I used to talk a lot about the theory of religious cognitive psyc…
Humans are at least 8% virus
In the comments below there is a lot of talk about the worry of transferring gene X from organism 1 to organism 2, where the two organisms are very far apart on the tree of life. I’m a little sanguine about this, but that’s because there is…
Prop 37 and the right to have the government enforce your right to know
With the election coming up, California Proposition 37, Mandatory Labeling of Genetically Engineered Food, is on my mind. From Ballotpedia:
If Proposition 37 is approved by voters, it will:
* Require labeling on raw or processed food offered for sale …
I, for one welcome our yellow overlords!
The above infographic from The New York Times article For Asians, School Tests Are Vital Steppingstones, was titled “1027-asians” when I tried to save it. No idea why, but I think that’s an amusing file name. My offensively titled po…
Doctors are apparently gods, get used to it
Here’s a caption from a Time article, What Your Doctor Isn’t Telling You About Your DNA:
Nice to know that two physicians in Philadelphia not only have medical degrees, but specialize in mind-reading the parents of this nation! Above the capti…
A golden age of sibling comparisons
Image credit: Assumption-Free Estimation of Heritability from Genome-Wide Identity-by-Descent Sharing between Full Siblings
I really love the paper Assumption-Free Estimation of Heritability from Genome-Wide Identity-by-Descent Sharing between Full S…
Open thread, 10-25-2012
Let your voice be heard!
Putting a stop on the biological clock
Egg freezing enters clinical mainstream:
Egg freezing is no longer an experimental procedure, according to the American Society for Reproductive Medicine (ASRM), which on 22 October issued new guidelines on the controversial practice. The change in pol…
General Social Survey on the desktop
Anthony Damico has a How-to up, with scripts. Last I tried it the GSS data set was rather large, and I preferred using the web interface. But your mileage may vary.
Why chimpanzees can donate blood in movies
There is a high likelihood that you know of which ABO blood group you belong to. I am A. My daughter is A. My father is B. My mother is A. I have siblings who are A, O, B, and AB. The inheritance is roughly Mendelian, with O being “recessiveR…
One girl, one exome
Interesting story in The San Jose Mercury News, Open-source science helps San Carlos father’s genetic quest:
“We used materials that are public, freely available,” said Rienhoff, a physician and scientist, as Beatrice frolicked nearby…
One girl, one exome
Interesting story in The San Jose Mercury News, Open-source science helps San Carlos father’s genetic quest:
“We used materials that are public, freely available,” said Rienhoff, a physician and scientist, as Beatrice frolicked nearby…
GEDmatch needs funds!
I noticed today that GEDmatch is trying to raise funds to cover the cost of their web services. What are those services? Basically if you get raw data back from direct-to-consumer genotyping firms GEDmatch allows you to run further analytics. You can d…
Dogs, domesticated before agriculture
The domestication of the dog is a complex and unresolved topic. But at this point I am convinced that this is one domestication event which well predates agriculture. To some extent this is common sense. There are tentative archaeological finds of dome…
The arcane art of ancient admixture
I have mentioned the PLoS Genetics paper, The Date of Interbreeding between Neandertals and Modern Humans, before because a version of it was put up on arXiv. The final paper has a few additions. For example, it mentions the generally panned (at leas…
All original GSS analyses in charts are Creative Commons
Every now and then I get emails/inquiries about using my simple “quick & dirty” charts. I always give permission, and in fact I never complain when other (usually more popular!) weblogs use them. Even on the very rare occasions where at…
Buddy can you spare a selective sweep
The Pith: Natural selection comes in different flavors in its genetic constituents. Some of those constituents are more elusive than others. That makes “reading the label” a non-trivial activity.
As you may know when you look at patterns of…
Newsweek formed me (sort of)
You know that Newsweek is ending its print edition. This was long in the coming. What I find interesting is that apparently its circulation peaked in 1991, at 3.3 million. It declined to 3.1 million in 2007, and literally cratered over the past 5 years…