Human evolution; Denisovan DNA in Papuans (Introduction)

by David Turell , Thursday, December 08, 2022, 20:46 (497 days ago) @ David Turell

Helps with immunity:

https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/dna-from-extinct-human-relative-may-have-sha...

"Thousands of years ago, the ancestors of modern humans met and mated with Neandertals—and also with their close cousins and contemporaries, Denisovans. Though both Neandertals and Denisovans later went extinct (with Denisovans possibly sticking around until as recently as 15,000 years ago), billions of people around the world still carry the proof of these interactions in their DNA.

"Why these genetic fragments from extinct humans have stuck around isn’t entirely clear. But the new study, published on Thursday in PLOS Genetics, finds disease resistance might have been involved. The research—conducted by Irene Gallego Romero, a human evolutionary geneticist at the University of Melbourne in Australia, and her colleagues—suggests that certain mutations from long-gone Denisovans may help today’s Papuans fend off viral infections.

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"The Indigenous people of New Guinea and Australia have some of the highest concentrations of Denisovan DNA in the world, with an average of around 5 percent of this DNA in their respective genomes. So Gallego Romero and her colleagues decided to sort through the genomes of 56 Papuans to examine what parts of their genetic sequences retained Denisovan DNA.

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"In particular, the Denisovan mutations were in regions that control genes involved in responding to viral infection.

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"Denisovans in New Guinea may have had tens of thousands of years longer to adapt to local diseases before modern humans showed up. Thus, the descendants of people who bred with Denisovans may have carried mutations that helped them overcome the worst of these illnesses.

"Such research shows why studying diverse groups can help reveal how humans adjusted to new environments and can “highlight how human diversity is important for adaptation,” says Lluis Quintana-Murci, a population geneticist at France’s Pasteur Institute, who was not involved with the new study." (my bold)

Comment: each group of 'homos' in the past were diverse. The bold supports my thought that God created this diversity to mold the eventual human immunity system to make it broader. WE know Neandertal genes in our DNA support immune activity.