Monique
May1-03, 01:42 PM
This is pretty cool, in Science an article was published which describes a human polymorphism which protects us from the disease Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease and/or Kuru which are both caused by eating brains contaminated with a certain kind of protein, prions.
A selection for this polymorphism would be achieved by a history of cannibalism in an population. This polymorphism seems to have recorded our canibalistic history.
See:
http://www.sciencemag.org/content/vol300/issue5619/twis.shtml#300/5619/545a for a short description
or:
http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/abstract/300/5619/640 for the abstract which will take you to the article if you have access.
A selection for this polymorphism would be achieved by a history of cannibalism in an population. This polymorphism seems to have recorded our canibalistic history.
See:
http://www.sciencemag.org/content/vol300/issue5619/twis.shtml#300/5619/545a for a short description
or:
http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/abstract/300/5619/640 for the abstract which will take you to the article if you have access.