The Malthusian parameter of ascents: what prevents the exponential increase of one's ancestors?

Refining the ideas of "ethnic" skin

Skin disease occur worldwide, affecting people of all nationalities and all skin types. These diseases may have a genetic component and may manifest differently in specific population groups; however, there has been little study on this aspect. If population-based differences exist, it is reasonable to assume that understanding these differences may optimize treatment. While there is a relative paucity of information about similarities and differences in skin diseases around the world, the knowledge-base is expanding. One challenge in understanding population-based variations is posed by terminology used in the literature: including ethnic skin, Hispanic skin, Asian skin, and skin of color. As will be discussed in this article, we recommend that the first three descriptors are no longer used in dermatology because they refer to nonspecific groups of people. In contrast, "skin of color" may be used - perhaps with further refinements in the future - as a term that relates to skin biology and provides relevant information to dermatologists.

Markov-chain approach to the distribution of ancestors in species of biparental reproduction

We studied how to obtain a distribution for the number of ancestors in species of sexual reproduction. Present models concentrate on the estimation of distributions repetitions of ancestors in genealogical trees. It has been shown that it is not possible to reconstruct the genealogical history of each species along all its generations by means of a geometric progression. This analysis demonstrates that it is possible to rebuild the tree of progenitors by modeling the problem with a Markov chain. For each generation, the maximum number of possible ancestors is different. This presents huge problems for the resolution. We found a solution through a dilation of the sample space, although the distribution defined there takes smaller values with respect to the initial problem. In order to correct the distribution for each generation, we introduced the invariance under a gauge (local) group of dilations. These ideas can be used to study the interaction of several processes and provide a new approach on the problem of the common ancestor. In the same direction, this model also provides some elements that can be used to improve models of animal reproduction.

Surname distribution in population genetics and in statistical physics

Surnames tend to behave like neutral genes, and their distribution has attracted a growing attention from genetists and physicists. We review the century-long history of surname studies and discuss the most recent developments. Isonymy has been regarded as a tool for the measurement of consanguinity of individuals and populations and has been applied to the analysis of migrations. The analogy between patrilineal surname transmission and the propagation of Y chromosomes has been exploited for the genetic characterization of families, communities and control groups. Surname distribution is the result of a stochastic dynamics, which has been studied either as a Yule process or as a branching phenomenon: both approaches predict the asymptotic power-law behavior which has been observed in many empirical researches. Models of neutral evolution based on the theory of disordered systems have suggested the application of field-theoretical techniques, and in particular the Renormalization Group, to describe the dynamics leading to scale-invariant distributions and to compute the related (critical) exponents.

Quantification of inbreeding due to distant ancestors and its detection using dense single nucleotide polymorphism data

Inbreeding depression, which refers to reduced fitness among offspring of related parents, has traditionally been studied using pedigrees. In practice, pedigree information is difficult to obtain, potentially unreliable, and rarely assessed for inbreeding arising from common ancestors who lived more than a few generations ago. Recently, there has been excitement about using SNP data to estimate inbreeding (F) arising from distant common ancestors in apparently “outbred” populations. Statistical power to detect inbreeding depression using SNP data depends on the actual variation in inbreeding in a population, the accuracy of detecting that with marker data, the effect size, and the sample size. No one has yet investigated what variation in F is expected in SNP data as a function of population size, and it is unclear which estimate of F is optimal for detecting inbreeding depression. In the present study, we use theory, simulated genetic data, and real genetic data to find the optimal estimate of F, to quantify the likely variation in F in populations of various sizes, and to estimate the power to detect inbreeding depression. We find that F estimated from runs of homozygosity (F_roh), which reflects shared ancestry of genetic haplotypes, retains variation in even large populations (e.g., SD = 0.5% when N_e = 10,000) and is likely to be the most powerful method of detecting inbreeding effects from among several alternative estimates of F. However, large samples (e.g., 12,000–65,000) will be required to detect inbreeding depression for likely effect sizes, and so studies using F_roh to date have probably been underpowered.

Improving human forensics through advances in genetics, genomics and molecular biology

Forensic DNA profiling currently allows the identification of persons already known to investigating authorities. Recent advances have produced new types of genetic markers with the potential to overcome some important limitations of current DNA profiling methods. Moreover, other developments are enabling completely new kinds of forensically relevant information to be extracted from biological samples. These include new molecular approaches for finding individuals previously unknown to investigators, and new molecular methods to support links between forensic sample donors and criminal acts. Such advances in genetics, genomics and molecular biology are likely to improve human forensic case work in the near future.

Inbreeding, pedigree size, and the most recent common ancestor of humanity

How many generations ago did the common ancestor of all present-day individuals live, and how does inbreeding affect this estimate? The number of ancestors within family trees determines the timing of the most recent common ancestor of humanity. However, mating is often non-random and inbreeding is ubiquitous in natural populations. Rates of pedigree growth are found for multiple types of inbreeding. This data is then combined with models of global population structure to estimate biparental coalescence times. When pedigrees for regular systems of mating are constructed, the growth rates of inbred populations contain Fibonacci n-step constants. The timing of the most recent common ancestor depends on global population structure, the mean rate of pedigree growth, mean fitness, and current population size. Inbreeding reduces the number of ancestors in a pedigree, pushing back global common ancestry times. These results are consistent with the remarkable findings of previous studies: all humanity shares common ancestry in the recent past.

The use of racial, ethnic, and ancestral categories in human genetics research

The global dispersal of anatomically modern humans over the past 100,000 years has produced patterns of phenotypic variation that have exerted--and continue to exert--powerful influences on the lives of individuals and the experiences of groups. The recency of our common ancestry and continued gene flow among populations have resulted in less genetic differentiation among geographically distributed human populations than is observed in many other mammalian species. Nevertheless, differences in appearance have contributed to the development of ideas about "race" and "ethnicity" that often include the belief that significant inherited differences distinguish humans. The use of racial, ethnic, and ancestral categories in genetics research can imply that group differences arise directly through differing allele frequencies, with little influence from socially mediated mechanisms. At the same time, careful investigations of the biological, environmental, social, and psychological attributes associated with these categories will be an essential component of cross-disciplinary research into the origins, prevention, and treatment of common diseases, including those diseases that differ in prevalence among groups.

Modelling the recent common ancestry of all living humans

If a common ancestor of all living humans is defined as an individual who is a genealogical ancestor of all present-day people, the most recent common ancestor (MRCA) for a randomly mating population would have lived in the very recent past. However, the random mating model ignores essential aspects of population substructure, such as the tendency of individuals to choose mates from the same social group, and the relative isolation of geographically separated groups. Here we show that recent common ancestors also emerge from two models incorporating substantial population substructure. One model, designed for simplicity and theoretical insight, yields explicit mathematical results through a probabilistic analysis. A more elaborate second model, designed to capture historical population dynamics in a more realistic way, is analysed computationally through Monte Carlo simulations. These analyses suggest that the genealogies of all living humans overlap in remarkable ways in the recent past. In particular, the MRCA of all present-day humans lived just a few thousand years ago in these models. Moreover, among all individuals living more than just a few thousand years earlier than the MRCA, each present-day human has exactly the same set of genealogical ancestors.

On the genealogy of a population of biparental individuals

If one goes backward in time, the number of ancestors of an individual doubles at each generation. This exponential growth very quickly exceeds the population size, when this size is finite. As a consequence, the ancestors of a given individual cannot be all different and most remote ancestors are repeated many times in any genealogical tree. The statistical properties of these repetitions in genealogical trees of individuals for a panmictic closed population of constant size N can be calculated. We show that the distribution of the repetitions of ancestors reaches a stationary shape after a small number G(c) approximately log N of generations in the past, that only about 80% of the ancestral population belongs to the tree (due to coalescence of branches), and that two trees for individuals in the same population become identical after G(c)generations have elapsed. Our analysis is easy to extend to the case of exponentially growing population.

The one ancestor per generation rule and three other rules of mitochondrial inheritance

In mammals, at least, a species-specific mechanism exists that eliminates sperm-derived mitochondrial DNA from a fertilized egg. The result is the "one female ancestor per generation" rule and three other rules of mitochondrial inheritance. The second, third, and fourth rules are as follows. (ii) Sublineages of a given mitochondrial line can be generated only during the parallel descents from ancestral sisters. (iii) In a static population in which the production of one female progeny per mated pair per generation has been a rule, several ancient mitochondrial lineages harking back to the female founders of the speciation may persist side by side. (iv) Two or more individuals not related to each other in the recent past may share the identical or nearly identical mitochondrial genome derived from the common female ancestor or ancestral sisters of many generations ago.