Kirsten Ircha            1/8/18  
AP Biology E/F Even      Current Event #13

Citation:

Strickland, Ashley. “11,500-Year-Old Infant Remains Reveal Ancient Population.” CNN, Cable

News Network, 5 Jan. 2018, www.cnn.com/2018/01/05/health/ancient-population-discovery-alaska-trnd/index.html.

In the article “11,500-year-old infant remains reveal ancient population,” by Ashley Strickland, the author speaks on the discovery of two female infants in the burial pit at Upward Sun River, in the Tanana River valley in central Alaska. As the article describes, the local indigenous community gave these ancient babies the symbolic names, “Xach'itee'aanenh t'eede gaay (sunrise child-girl) and Yełkaanenh t'eede gaay (dawn twilight child-girl).” The first child was between six and twelve weeks of age while the second infant was premature and at thirty weeks of development. Both of the infants were found to be related and were most likely cousins. After DNA samples were collected from the first child, researchers were able to relate her genetics to Native Americans is a distinct way.  As Eske Willerslev, study co-author and professor at the University of  Copenhagen describes, “The DNA led the researchers to determine that they had found a previously unknown genetic population of Native Americans, which they dubbed Ancient Beringians, that represent the oldest known genetic lineage of Native Americans to date.”

This discovery is of vital importance as, "It changes our understanding of the timing of events that formed the genetics of Native Americans.”  This is because previously it had long been thought that the Natives migrated to America from East Asia 34,000 years ago using Beringia, or the land bridge that once connected Siberia and Alaska. These people were then believed to have formed the first population of ancestral Native Americans. Ben Potter, study co-author and department of anthropology chair and professor at the University of Alaska Fairbanks elaborates on this discovery stating, "This represents the first genetic data from the last Ice Age in Beringia. Prior to this study, we did not know that this Ancient Beringian population existed. We had evidence of the other branch leading to North and South Native Americans, and indirect evidence for a single founding population. So our findings show that the early history of ancestral Native Americans is more complex than previously known." This is especially interesting because it allows scientists and therefore society to understand history on a greater scale. Essentially 34,000 years ago, a population began to separate from Asia. However, genetic exchanges still continued to occur until about 25,000 years ago, meaning that this groups most likely end up in Alaska. This is 10,000 years earlier than previously thought. Then, about 25,000 years ago, this Asian group met a more European group of people and the Ancient Beringians came to be. After, about 20,000 years ago, this group began to move South and split into the two major lineages of Native Americans, “The northern and southern branches”. The discovery of the two ancient infants has led to these advanced discoveries. Without sunrise child-girl and dawn twilight child-girl, history would still remain unknown or inaccurate.

The article is written extremely well. All of the more scientific terminology is written in a simple way that allows a broad range of audiences and ages to understand the text. Furthermore, the article is a good length as it provided very useful information, yet is not overly wordy and disengaging. Although I enjoyed the piece, I feel a couple of areas could be improved simply. To begin, I feel that some of the points were repetitive and stated too many times. As the ideas would have been just as strong if they were written in a concise manner, the author should consider not stating the same ideas multiple times throughout the piece. Also, the author only cites information from a couple of scientists and does not give a wide range viewpoints. In the future, the author should use additional sources as this will make the article feel more developed and specific. Even with minor mistakes, I feel Strickland’s work is very enjoyable.