Saturday, July 31, 2010 11

science & technology

Human Evolution,
A Story That Is in Flux
By nICHolas WadE
Many people have assumed that
humans ceased to evolve in the
distant past, perhaps when people
first learned to protect themselves
against cold, famine and other harsh
agents of natural selection. But bi-
ologists peering into the human ge-
nome sequences now available from
around the world have found increas-
ing evidence of natural selection at
work in the last few thousand years,
leading many to assume that human
that 4,243 genes — 23 percent of the
human total — were under natural
selection. This is a surprisingly high
proportion.
A new approach has been devel-
oped by Anna Di Rienzo at the Uni-
versity of Chicago. Dr. Di Rienzo and
her colleagues have started with
genes that would be likely to change
as people adopted different environ-
ments and diets, and then checked to
see how different populations have
responded. The New York Times

evolution is still in progress.
Scientists from the Beijing Ge-
nomics Institute, for example, have
discovered that among Tibetans, a
set of genes evolved to cope with low
oxygen levels as recently as 3,000
years ago. This, if confirmed, would
be the most recent known instance
of human evolution.
“I don’t think there is any reason
to suppose that the rate has slowed
down or decreased,” says Mark
Stoneking, a population geneticist
in Leipzig, Germany.
Natural selection can now be as-
sessed across the whole human ge-
nome. This has been made possible
by data derived mostly from the
Hap Map, a United States govern-
ment project. The Hap Map contains
samples from 11 populations around
the world and consists of readings
of DNA at sites along the genome
where variations are common.
One of the signatures of natural
selection is that it disturbs the un-
dergrowth of mutations that accu-
mulate along the genome.
As a favored version of a gene be-
She found particularly strong sig- Tibetans, such as these monks, possess genes that evolved to cope with low oxygen as recently as 3,000 years ago.
nals of selection in populations that
live in polar regions, in people who
Genetic Changes
live by foraging, and in people whose
diets are rich in roots and tubers, she Researchers have found increasing evidence of recent human evolution in response to local changes in diet, disease and climate.
and her colleagues reported in May
in the Proceedings of the National
Academy of Sciences. RUSSIA MONGOLIA
The fewest signals of selection
were seen among people who live
in the humid tropics, where the an- EUROPE
cestral human population evolved. CHINA
“One could argue that we are adapt- JAPAN
ed to that and that most signals are
seen when people adapt to new envi- TIBET
ronments,” Dr. Di Rienzo said. AFRICA
Sites of rice domestication:
In one adaptation, most East 6,000 to 12,000 years ago
Asians were found to have a special 3,000 to 6,000 years ago
form of a gene known as ABCC11, Proportion of
which makes the cells of the ear pro- people with the Percentage of people
duce dry earwax. golden gene with the ADH1B variant.
But most Africans and Europeans variant.
VIETNAM
possess the ancestral form of the 20 40 60 80%
gene, which makes wet earwax.
The Asian version of the gene may SKIN COLOR Europeans and Asians probably acquired lighter skin to ALCOHOL A variation in a gene called ADH1B protects against
have been selected for some prop- better synthesize vitamin D. A variant known as the golden gene is intoxication, making the skin flush when a person drinks. The variant
erty like making people sweat less, found in more than 98 percent of Europeans but is rare in East Asia, became almost universal among southern Chinese after rice cultivation
says a team led by Koh-ichiro Yoshi- where lighter skin is thought to derive from a different set of genes. and fermentation began about 10,000 years ago.
ura of Nagasaki University. Sources: Molecular Biology and Evolution; BMC Evolutionary Biology THE NEW YORK TIMES

comes more common in a popula- The cases of natural selection that

tion, genomes will look increasingly
alike in and near the gene. Because
variation is brushed away, the fa-
vored gene’s rise in popularity is
called a sweep. Geneticists have de-
veloped several statistical methods
for detecting sweeps, and hence of
natural selection in action.
About 21 genome-wide scans for
natural selection had been complet-
ed by last year, providing evidence
have been tracked so far take the
form of substantial sweeps, with a
new version of a gene being present
in a large percentage of the popula-
tion.
These hard sweeps are often as-
sumed to start from a novel muta-
tion. But it could take as long as
300,000 generations to occur, ac-
cording to a calculation by Jonathan
Pritchard, a population geneticist at
the University of Chicago.
But the new evidence that hu-
mans have adapted rapidly and
extensively suggests that natural
selection must have other options
for changing a trait. In Current Biol-
ogy in February, Dr. Pritchard sug-
gested that natural selection may
take place through what he called
soft sweeps.
Suppose there are a hundred
genes that affect height. Each gene
exists in a version that enhances
height and one that does not.
The average person might inherit
the height-enhancing version of 50
of these genes, and be of average
height as a result.
Suppose this population migrates
to a region where it is an advantage
to be very tall. Natural selection
need only make the height-enhanc-
ing versions of these 100 genes just
a little more common in the popula-
tion, and now the average person
will be likely to inherit 55 of them,
say, instead of 50, and be taller as a
result.
Since the height-enhancing ver-
sions of the genes already exist, nat-
ural selection can go to work right
away and the population can adapt
quickly to its new home.

Home Computers Fail to Aid Poorer Students, Study Says

By randall stross
Economists are trying to mea-
sure a home computer’s education-
al impact on schoolchildren in low-
income households. Taking widely
varying routes, they are arriving at
similar conclusions: little or no edu-
cational benefit is found.
of Chicago, investigated educational
outcomes after low-income families
in Romania received government
vouchers to help them buy comput-
ers.
“We found a negative effect on aca-
demic achievement,” he said. “I was
surprised, but as we presented our
puter skills.
At that time, most Romanian
households were not yet connected
to the Internet. But few children
whose families obtained comput-
ers said they used the machines for
homework. What they were used for
— daily — was playing games.
nificantly lower reading scores as
well when the number of broadband
providers passed four.
The Duke paper reports that the
negative effect on test scores was
largely confined to lower-income
households, in which parental su-
pervision might be spottier, giving chrisTophe vorleT

Worse, computers seem to have
further separated children in low-in-
come households, whose test scores
often decline after the machine ar-
rives, from their more privileged
counterparts.
Ofer Malamud, an assistant pro-
fessor of economics at the University
Randall Stross is an author and
professor in Silicon Valley.
findings at various seminars, people
in the audience said they weren’t sur-
prised, given their own experiences
with their school-age children.”
The study found “strong evidence
that children in households who won
a voucher received significantly
lower school grades in math, Eng-
lish and Romanian.”
The principal positive effect on
the students was improved com-
In the United States, Jacob L.
Vigdor and Helen F. Ladd, profes-
sors of public policy at Duke Univer-
sity, reported similar findings after
studying the arrival of broadband
service in North Carolina and its
effect on school test scores over five
years. Students posted significantly
lower math test scores after the first
broadband service provider showed
up in their neighborhood, and sig-
students greater opportunity to use
the computer for entertainment and
reducing the amount of time spent
studying.
The state of Texas recently com-
pleted a four-year experiment
in “technology immersion.” The
project spent $20 million in federal
money on laptops distributed to 21
schools whose students were per-
mitted to take the machines home.
A study finds that a computer’s
main positive effect on students
was better computer skills.
The one area where the students
from lower-income families in the
immersion program closed the gap
with higher-income students was
the same one identified in the Roma-
nian study: computer skills.