Briggs, Helen. “DNA from Stone Age Woman Obtained 6,000 Years On.” BBC News, BBC, 17 Dec. 2019, www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-50809586.

Erin Kaye

1/23/19

AP Biology

Current Event 14

Briggs, Helen. “DNA from Stone Age Woman Obtained 6,000 Years On.” BBC News, BBC, 17 Dec. 2019, www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-50809586.

The article “DNA from Stone Age Woman Obtained 6,000 Years On” was written by Helen Briggs and published in the BBC. Scientists were able to obtain the DNA from a woman from a piece of “chewing gum,” which is tar from a tree. This is important because there are no other human remains from this time period. This also marked the first time an entire human genome was extracted from anything other than bone. The code was used to decipher what the woman looked like and it is likely that she had dark skin, dark brown hair, and blue eyes. She is more genetically related to the hunter-gatherers of mainland Europe, than to those who lived in Scandinavia. This tells us that she was likely descended from a population of settlers that moved to western Europe after the glaciers retreated. She could have possibly lived on Syltholm on Lolland, an island of Denmark. From the DNA we can also learn that her diet at the time consisted of hazelnut and mallard. The researchers extracted the DNA from microbes attached in the tar, where they found pathogens that cause glandular fever and pneumonia as well as other natural viruses and bacteria. This information is important because it offers information on people’s lives, ancestry, livelihood, health, and how human pathogens have evolved.

This article could have a strong effect on society because it can tell us about history, ancestry, livelihood, health, and how human pathogens have evolved. This is important as quoted from Dr. Schoeder because “we can study how they evolved and how they are different to strains that are present nowadays. And that tells us something about how they have spread.”

Briggs did a very good job quoting different researchers on their thoughts on this study. This added validity and made it more interesting to read. Briggs also did a good job including different subtopics, which made the article easier to follow. Briggs could have improved their article by placing the pictures included under the subtopics or paragraph they correlated to. The fact that the pictures were placed randomly disrupted the flow and understanding of the reader.