Biology Reference
In-Depth Information
CHAPTER
16
M
olecular Method
s
Graciela S. Cabana, Brannon I. Hulsey, Frankie L. Pack
INTRODUCTION
Anthropological use of molecular data has grown tremendously in the last decade. This
phenomenon has contributed to an increased enthusiasm towards long-standing anthropo-
logical debates, such as human origins, our relationship to extant and extinct human and
nonhuman primates, and the pattern and meaning behind global and local human variation.
More than simply adding another corroborating line of evidence (` la
Chamberlin, 1965
),
recent molecular methods have added to, and even upturned, previous knowledge. Perhaps
the most prominent example is in the Neandertal
e
modern human debate. From the 1990s
onward, the consensus among scientists was that Neandertals effectively contributed
nothing, genetically speaking, to modern human variation. However, because of techno-
logical breakthroughs of the last decade, we now have genetic evidence not only for the inter-
breeding of Neandertals and modern humans (
Green et al., 2010
), but also for interbreeding
among other archaic humans, Neandertals, and modern humans in differing proportions in
different parts of the Old World (
Reich et al., 2010
).
As this chapter will show, the use of molecular methods in anthropology has been around
since at least the early twentieth century. In the last decade, we have been witnessing an
unprecedented shift in our ability to access much more of the genome due to rapid techno-
logical advances, large-scale initiatives for data collection, and a parallel development of
population databases, many of which are freely accessible and ever-growing. Accessing
more of the genome combined with the mathematical and computational power to draw
significant associations means that those questions that have been plaguing us for the better
part of a century can now be feasibly addressed.
This chapter is intended to function as a practical guide to incorporating molecular
methods into the skeletal biologist's research program. How are molecular methods relevant,
and how does the aspiring skeletal biologist/geneticist use them? The chapter begins with
a brief history of the use and role of genetics in anthropology from the 1900s to the present.
The chapter moves on to provide some of the key theoretical, methodological, and interpre-
tive understandings needed to develop a molecular complement to skeletal biological
research. At that point the chapter turns to the practicalities of initiating a molecular study
