Human and Chimp: Can Our Genes Tell the Story of Our Divergence?

0929 IM model has required the assumption that all of the populations were constant in size, and therefore it has not been useful for assessing how descendant populations arose or changed in size. Hey analyzed DNA sequences from nine loci, so that the population genetic history could be found despite the variation among genes. He also added an additional parameter to the standard IM model to incorporate changes in the size of the ancestral population and of each founder population through time. The genetic data included DNA sequences from Asian and American Indian individuals. Hey varied the parameters in his model, which included founding population size, changes in population size, time of population formation (and splitting), and gene exchange between the populations, to work out the demographic scenario that best fi t the available genetic data. His analysis suggests that only about 70 individuals left their ancestral Asian population, estimated at about 9,000 individuals, to reach America 7,000 to 14,000 years ago. Archeological evidence places the earliest American inhabitants in the New World at around 14,000 years ago. Though Hey's estimates are more recent, they also indicate a high probability at this time period. Hey did not include genetic data from Eskimo-Aleut and Na Déne speakers, so the number of migrations was not addressed. But with this new approach, researchers will be able to explore this and many other questions to fi ll in the details of the fi rst American immigration. About 14,000 years ago—a few hundred thousand years after our putative modern forebears spread out from Africa—descendants of archaic humans crossed the Bering land bridge from Siberia to North America. Several lines of evidence support this model, but that's where the consensus ends. The details remain hotly debated, focusing mostly on which Asian population migrated, when they did it, and whether they did it more than once. Part of the challenge in reconstructing this history stems from the dynamic nature of human populations—which experience unpredictable changes in size, composition, density, and mating patterns—and the diffi culty in interpreting genetic history. To get a better picture of the range of possible scenarios, scientists are using new statistical approaches that require computer simulations. Jody Hey now extends this approach in a novel method for the study of the origins of New World populations. Along with DNA analysis and computer simulations, Hey adds a new twist to an old model to …