Y-chromosomal Adam
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In human genetics, Y-chromosomal Adam (Y-mrca) is the patrilinear human most recent common ancestor, from whom all Y chromosomes in living humans are descended. Y-chromosomal Adam is thus the male counterpart of Mitochondrial Eve (the mt-mrca), the matrilinear human most recent common ancestor, from whom all mitochondrial DNA in living humans is descended.
They are named after the "Adam" and "Eve" in Genesis as a metaphor only, and are not considered to be the first humans. Also note that the Y-mrca is not the same individual at all points in human history: The Y-mrca of all humans alive today is different from the one for humans alive at some point in the remote past or future: as male lines die out, a more recent individual becomes the new Y-mrca. In times of rapid population growth, patrilinear lines are less likely to die out than during a population bottleneck.
The Y-chromosomal Adam for living humans probably lived between 60,000 and 90,000 years ago, judging from molecular clock and genetic marker studies. While their descendants certainly became close intimates, Y-chromosomal Adam and mitochondrial Eve are separated by at least 30,000 years, or many hundred generations.
The more recent age of the Y-mrca compared to the mt-mrca corresponds to a larger statistical dispersion of the probability distribution for a paleolithic man to have living descendants compared to that of a paleolithic woman. While fertile women had more or less equally distributed chances of giving birth to a certain number of fertile descendants, chances for fertile men varied more widely, with some fathering no children and others fathering many, with multiple women.
See also
- Y chromosome
- Human Y-chromosome DNA haplogroups
- Single-origin hypothesis
- Adam's Curse (book by Bryan Sykes)
- Genetic genealogy
- Mitochondrial Eve
- Most recent common ancestor
- Y-chromosomal Aaron
References
- "Modern Men Trace Ancestry to African Migrants", A Gibbons, Volume 292, Number 5519, Issue of 11 May 2001, pp. 1051-1052.
- "[African Origin of Modern Humans in East Asia: A Tale of 12,000 Y Chromosomes]", Yuehai Ke et al, Science 2001 292: 1151-1153
- Fazale Rana and Ross, Hugh, Who Was Adam: A Creation Model Approach to the Origin of Man, 2005, ISBN 1-576-83577-4
External links
- [Documentary Redraws Humans' Family Tree] (from National Geographic)
- [Y-Chromosome Biallelic Haplogroups]
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