My long trips ended with college as I started working soon thereafter. The pressures and pulls of the job hardly give any time to plan vacations with friends. The only way to 'vacation' are official trips. In college, I was pretty fascinated when I used to hear that a particular senior of mine had gone on such a trip. These trips were mostly outside India especially in US, thus, giving a lot of exposure to their benefactor. In addition, I viewed them as the recognition of talent of the employee by the employer who is giving the employee a chance to interact with client. As soon as I saw photographs and status messages of seniors who were recently back from such official trips outside India I used to pester them to tell me about their experiences by bombarding them with questions on orkut and chat sessions. :)

Not surprisingly, I agreed to go on a small official visit to Europe as soon as it was offered to me. It was my first trip outside India. The fact that it was to Europe made it all the more special as I loved the beauty of that part of the world as seen from bollywood films. The reality started sinking only after my visa application got approved and I was scheduled to fly that very week. I started thinking about the vast expanse of human existence. I realized that the same human beings occupy parts of the world from california to sydney and from russia to zimbabwe. It was a sweet recognition of the fact that all of us are the same individuals separated by historic migration. After all, we were of the same size, had the same desires and looked the same- the different was only skin deep. (Interested in human migration can refer to these two webages - a Wiki and National Geographic project).

I were to visit Sweden, Denmark, Germany and France giving me a chance to observe a large part of the developed Europe. Travelling through four countries in 10 days gave me a chance to look at them as a whole. I was in a position where I would be forming impressions on each of the countries in quick successions and amalgamating them to form a larger picture.

My first steps on foreign soil were in Amsterdam where I had stopover for a connecting flight. The first thing that I noticed was empty airport terminals and the 'excessive' infrastructure. I couldnt help comparing it with India - How can a small country boast of such amazing infrastructure whereas in India we are grappling with the basic amenities? I pondered over various theories that could justify and concluded it was a combination of small population and a colonial past. These countries have accessed cheap labour and raw materials by fighting wars and signing treaties. Although, I was in Europe but strangely the feeling of being in a foreign country wasn't sinking in. Since, I had a connecting flight in 3 hours I didnt have time to step out of the airport. The airport terminal was new and swanky. It was constructed using modern architecture which relied heavily on glass and steel. It almost felt like being in a mall in New Delhi (a la City Select Saket). This got corrected when I visited Stockholm. It was beautiful and traditional - cobbled streets, statues, canals.

Over the entire trip one of the most interesting observations was that everyone in the world have similar aspirations. No matter how many people I talked to most of them aspired for similar things as we did in India. Everyone wanted to own a house, buy a great car, peace in life and world and, do 'something exceptional'.

I also observed that overall the regions within Europe do not have much difference with each other which was radically different of what you would observe in South Asia. In each country you have a different cuisine and language, but the difference ceases there. You cannot fail to realise that the environment is predictable and everything is similar if not the same. One of the in your face observation is that most people there drive black cars and wear black dresses. Even when you go in malls you find only plain colours. Here on my travels in India, I would see the culture, dialect, the type of clothes, the colour of clothes changing every 60 kilometres or so. As soon as you enter punjab, haryana, or rajasthan you see varied multitude of colours. In other words, the change in much more intense and abrupt in India as compared to Europe.

You actually feel freedom in Europe. I think it is the best place in the world. You are free to do anything unless you are not harming anyone. Such freedom was something new to me as in India we are typically free under restrictions. The threat of terrorism has already bled much of the freedom and there are now many ideologues which propound stretched theories to curb more freedom. For me it was the best experience... I didn't feel the same exhilaration even on climbing eiffel tower.

Culturally, the two parts of the world are strinkingly different. It does'nt make any sense to draw any comparison between the two, but the fact is that they are very different from each other and that the integration of the two is very difficult. Some of things that are anathema to us are pretty normal there whereas some of our things would seem illogical to those. The need is to respect cultures individually and not to compare. I think that this generation of ours would face the challenge of living in multiple cultures and belonging to none. This would be a bit lonely generation.

Finally, the respect for law and human rights. You really have to see it and observe how it changes country. Infact, I think I should add this as the third point to answer the creation of such wealth in Europe.

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• UN Hypocrisy: Kick the CO2 Habit!
• The myth of keeping CO2 under 450ppm

The paper is titled, "Inferring Human Colonization History Using a Copying Model." This study is based off of inheritance patterns of 2,000 SNPs from the Human Genome Diversity Project (HGDP) dataset from 2006. The dataset comes from 927 individuals from 53 different populations. Not all populations are included in this dataset, so there are gaps... But for any anthropologist out there who is interested with the tempo certain human populations radiated as well as their ancestry patterns, this open access paper is a must read.

The new "copy model" resolves much finer details because it compares the structure of chromosomes -- i.e. how the haplotypes spread on a chromosome are inherited. This makes it possible to delve further back in time and identify smaller genetic contributions. You may know that other models have resorted to single loci, such as the Y-chromosome or mtDNA. It has been argued that these models oversimplify heredity. By analyzing shared parts of chromosomes across the entire human genome, the researchers believe their method can cope with much larger datasets, suggesting that over 500,000 genetic markers can be compared and contrasted in the future.

This paper has yielded both consistent and surprising results. For starters, the results are right inline with the Out of Africa model. In the video clips below, you can see that for yourself

Inferred history of the peopling of the world.

[googlevideo=http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=5695532450353372124]

Donors are listed at the bottom in order according to the mean number of individuals that are used. Click to see the original movie in high res.

Did you noticed that the San are the beginning population? That's obviously because the San of Southern Africa are the first population in the ordering of chromosomes. According to Spencer Wells, the San are one of the oldest, if not the oldest, peoples in the world based upon the Y-chromosome. Exactly one month ago, a study of mitochondrial genetic diversity within Africa kinda challenged this claim. But because this study used the HGDP dataset from 2006, the results are restricted to the populations included in the sample. The San gave rise to the Biaka, Bantu, and Mbuti populations which are all below the Sahara.

The last lineage to arise in Africa are the Mozabites, and based upon the 2,000 SNPs they have less in common with other African populations than the others African populations have with themselves. The authors suggest that this observation is because there was a bottleneck in the Mozabites that is not shared by any other African population.

The Mozabites gave rise to all the Central Eurasian populations in the HGDP sample. The Mozabites also gave rise to the Central European populations. The first three populations to arise in Europe are the French, Tuscans, and Italians. Several Near Eastern and Central Asian populations also contributed to the peopling of Central Europe.

East Asians have an entirely distinct source of ancestry from European peoples. The Uygurs and Hazara gave rise to Cambodian, Mongolian, Oroquen, Xibo, Yi, Tu, Daur, and Naxi people of East Asia. The Han also received their ancestry from the Xibo and other populations. Just how distinct is this cut-off? Well, less than 10% of Europeans show ancestry from the Uygurs. Almost no Europeans show ancestry from the Hazara. The authors suggest that this observation is because the East Asian populations were established independently from Europeans and only relatively recent admixture has affected the 10% Uygur-ness in European populations.

Many populations in Europe have exhibited distinct genetic, cultural, and linguistic traits such as the Basque. This study has shown that the Sardianians, Russians, Orcadians, and the Basque show strong similarities to other Europeans -- but have a lot more Near Eastern and Central Asian ancestry markers than other Europeans. For example, the Basque show some of their ancestry come from the Hezhen, a far Eastern population.

The Pacific Islanders receive ancestry from the Melanesians and Cambodians -- not surprising. The first Native American populations (the Colombians) share ancestry to the Hazara, Han, and Xibo, also not surprising. But since modern people were screened, the Colombians show European ancestry -- it is most likely because of the outstanding European occupation of the Americas in the last 500 or so years.

The somewhat surprising finding (at least surprising to the authors, editors of the paper, and apparently the bloggers at the Spittoon) is that there's strong Mongolian ancestry signal in the Pima people. This is distinctly differently from the Colombians, who have a much different ancestry. The authors write that this suggest independent waves of migration in the Americas which contradicts 'the current consensus.'

I believe that this statement should be revised because a more recent paper, published after this current paper was submitted, suggests that the Americas was peopled in multiple waves. I'm kinda surprised the editors didn't catch this. I'm also surprised the the bloggers behind the Spittoon, the 23andMe blog, didn't catch this. They are in the population genetics and personal genomics business, I expect them to keep current on their literature. Anyways, I was talking to Razib about this and he suggested if some sort of Na-Dene phenomenon could be happening. Definitely possibly... what do you think?

Inferred history of chromosomes for individual populations

[googlevideo=http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=6115910949925711828]

Each frame shows the path that chromosomes took from their origin in Southern Africa in reaching the population labelled in each frame. The width of each line indicates the proportion of the chromosomes that travelled by that route, with the diameter of the circle indicating the total proportion of chromosomes that went via that location (diameter of San = 1.0). Values were estimated recursively, working backwards from the labelled population to the first by assuming that the amount of genetic material passed on by each population was proportional to the number of donor individuals it contributed. Click to see the original movie in high res.

This paper is not the first to work around the single loci comparison critique, but it is successful and provides a template for others to work on. I'm really interested to see this same model applied to more SNPs and more populations.

Hellenthal, G., Auton, A., Falush, D., Przeworski, M. (2008). Inferring Human Colonization History Using a Copying Model. PLoS Genetics, 4(5), e1000078. DOI: 10.1371/journal.pgen.1000078

A confirmation of tipping point is presented in the following report by James Hansen, NASA climatologist:

Excerpts from Hansen's report:

• We are at the tipping point because the climate state includes large, ready positive feedbacks provided by the Arctic sea ice, the West Antarctic ice sheet, and much of Greenland’s ice.

• Our home planet is dangerously near a tipping point at which human-made greenhouse gases reach a level where major climate changes can proceed mostly under their own momentum. Warming will shift climatic zones by intensifying the hydrologic cycle, affecting freshwater availability and human health.

Source:Tipping Point: Here and Now!
Report:Tipping Point: PERSPECTIVE OF A CLIMATOLOGIST [PDF]

The ice in the Arctic is much younger than normal, with vast regions now covered by first-year ice and much less area covered by multiyear ice. Left: February distribution of ice by its age during normal Arctic conditions (1985-2000 average). Right: February 2008 Arctic ice age distribution. Credit: NSIDC [Caption: NASA]

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• Arctic Melting FAST!
• Greenland Ice Melt Faster Than IPCC Estimates
• Only Zero Emissions Would Avert Dangerous Warming
• Stern Report: “a great toxic dump of doublespeak in truly Orwellian fashion”

• Burning Earth
• Human Impact
• The First Wave of World’s Collapsing Cities
• Giga Trends
• Nuking Earth for Lifestyle

The paper, "Molecular Identification of Lice from Pre‐Columbian Mummies" is published in an early release of the Journal of Infectious Diseases. The authors amplified the Cytb and Cox1 genes of lice found on three 1,000 year old Peruvian mummies. The mummies are associated with the Chiribaya culture, a post Moche movement, that originated in the Azapa Valley of Northern Chile. I've cut and pasted a photo of one of the mummies sampled from the article, in this photo the authors show the lice still present on the head.

They next sequenced these amplified genes, and constructed phylogenetic trees of the genetic similarities these lice have to sequences of lice from other areas of the world. What they found from their cladistic analysis was that the lice associated with the mummies clustered only with sequences in the type A clade. Since type A clade are almost exclusive to Asia and Africa, the authors could confidently claim that the lice were not of European origin, which sports the type B clade of lice.

New World mummies as old has 10,000 years ago have lice, and the genetic evidence from this study now confirms the lice that existed in New World for the last 1,000 years was not of European origin. This work also tells of migration patterns of humans, much like the study on rat genetics did early this week. We can see that founding populations of people from the Old World carried over the type A clade of lice, over the Bering straight and to the Americas.

I really appreciated this article. Had it not been for this one citation to the Bible, about the presence of lice in historical populations, I would say this article is a perfect example of simple, enlightening science. The authors didn't obfuscate their research and provided a very graceful example of how a host-specific parasites of human brought in an additional line of evidence to understand human migrations. One last thing, I wonder what's the genotype of the lice found on the mummies in Arizona?

Raoult, D., Reed, D., Dittmar, K., Kirchman, J., Rolain, J., Guillen, S., Light, J. (2008). Molecular Identification of Lice from Pre-Columbian Mummies. The Journal of Infectious Diseases DOI: 10.1086/526520

The following table lists the world’s cities that are likely to collapse completely or partially by or before 2012¹ in the first wave of collapse. The collapse would be caused by a combination of environmental catastrophes; failing infrastructure; food, water and fuel shortages; infectious disease; civil conflict. Following the first phase of collapse, massive waves of human migration from the affected areas create domino effect that cause the collapse of the remaining population centers shortly after.

For Main Entry and Comments go to Collapsing Cities

HumanFlows is the first of a series of projects conceived during the Visualizar workshop organized by the Medialab Prado in Madrid. Led by graphic designer Miguel Cabanzo, the on-going project takes the growing trend of visualization into the study of globalization. HumanFlows maps trends of migration in the hopes of getting insight into their causes. Rather than focus exclusively on present trends, HumanFlows gathers data from the last 15 years to create a more comprehensive picture.

Given a clear visual idea of the directions people have moved their lives (realistically and figuratively), you can’t help but wonder why. What impetus encouraged huge groups of people from point A to point B, rather than point C? It’s simple to rattle off answers like “war” and “poverty” without thought, but to look at these maps and think of how actual humans have been impacted brings issues into a more powerful and personal focus.

Though still in its nascent stages, the project kicks off with map filters such as Gross Domestic Product and Unemployment. The goal is to build on this framework with more data and to shed light on the inter-connections between the different causes for people to migrate and the impact on the nations who receive them.

Ancient art is the chief focus of the foundation.

Examples of some of the most famous cave and rock paintings populate the site, along with many lesser known creations -- the eponymous paintings, the Bradshaw group, generally disappear from U.S. versions of world history texts. The Bradshaw Foundation website explains:

The Bradshaw Paintings are incredibly sophisticated, as you will see from the 32 pictures in the Paintings Section, yet they are not recent creations but originate from an unknown past period which some suggest could have been 50,000 years ago. This art form was first recorded by Joseph Bradshaw in 1891, when he was lost on an Kimberley expedition in the north west of Australia. Dr. Andreas Lommel stated on his expedition to the Kimberleys in 1955 that the rock art he referred to as the Bradshaw Paintings may well predate the present Australian Aborigines.

This ancient art carries a story that should intrigue even junior high school students, and it offers examples of archaeological techniques that are critical to determining the ages of undated art in the wild:

According to legend, they were made by birds. It was said that these birds pecked the rocks until their beaks bled, and then created these fine paintings by using a tail feather and their own blood. This art is of such antiquity that no pigment remains on the rock surface, it is impossible to use carbon dating technology. The composition of the original paints cant be determined, and whatever pigments were used have been locked into the rock itself as shades of Mulberry red, and have become impervious to the elements.

Fortuitously, in 1996 Grahame Walsh discovered a Bradshaw Painting partly covered by a fossilised Mud Wasp nest, which scientists have removed and analysed using a new technique of dating, determining it to be 17,000 + years old.

Texas history and geography teachers should note the Bradshaw Foundation's work on prehistorica art in the Pecos River Valley: "Pecos Experience: Art and archeaology in the lower Pecos." There is much more here than is found in most Texas history texts -- material useful for student projects or good lesson plans.

• Image: painting in Panther Cave, lower Pecos, Texas. Photo from Bradshaw Foundation.