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From: "Holly ferguson" <>
Subject: Re: [FERGUSON-DNA] Blue Eyes-Brown Eyes
Date: Wed, 6 Feb 2008 16:47:25 +0000
References: <47A9E6F5.8040609@thistleandbee.com><3FD9E5BD-987D-4BF4-9928-74DF5DD03E55@aol.com>
In-Reply-To: <3FD9E5BD-987D-4BF4-9928-74DF5DD03E55@aol.com>


I do but my dad's ferguson family all have brown.
Sent from my BlackBerry® wireless handheld

-----Original Message-----
From: bob <>

Date: Wed, 6 Feb 2008 09:34:19
To:,
Subject: Re: [FERGUSON-DNA] Blue Eyes-Brown Eyes


So, how many of our clan has blue eyes?


On Feb 6, 2008, at 8:57 AM, Sandy Sellers wrote:

> New research shows that people with blue eyes have a single, common
> ancestor. A team at the University of Copenhagen have tracked down a
> genetic mutation which took place 6-10,000 years ago and is the
> cause of
> the eye colour of all blue-eyed humans alive on the planet today. What
> is the genetic mutation
>
> “Originally, we all had brown eyes”, said Professor Eiberg from the
> Department of Cellular and Molecular Medicine. “But a genetic mutation
> affecting the OCA2 gene in our chromosomes resulted in the creation
> of a
> “switch”, which literally “turned off” the ability to produce brown
> eyes”. The OCA2 gene codes for the so-called P protein, which is
> involved in the production of melanin, the pigment that gives colour
> to
> our hair, eyes and skin. The “switch”, which is located in the gene
> adjacent to OCA2 does not, however, turn off the gene entirely, but
> rather limits its action to reducing the production of melanin in the
> iris – effectively “diluting” brown eyes to blue. The switch’s
> effect on
> OCA2 is very specific therefore. If the OCA2 gene had been completely
> destroyed or turned off, human beings would be without melanin in
> their
> hair, eyes or skin colour – a condition known as albinism. Limited
> genetic variation
>
> Variation in the colour of the eyes from brown to green can all be
> explained by the amount of melanin in the iris, but blue-eyed
> individuals only have a small degree of variation in the amount of
> melanin in their eyes. “From this we can conclude that all blue-eyed
> individuals are linked to the same ancestor,” says Professor Eiberg.
> “They have all inherited the same switch at exactly the same spot in
> their DNA.” Brown-eyed individuals, by contrast, have considerable
> individual variation in the area of their DNA that controls melanin
> production.
>
> Professor Eiberg and his team examined mitochondrial DNA and compared
> the eye colour of blue-eyed individuals in countries as diverse as
> Jordan, Denmark and Turkey. His findings are the latest in a decade of
> genetic research, which began in 1996, when Professor Eiberg first
> implicated the OCA2 gene as being responsible for eye colour. Nature
> shuffles our genes
>
> The mutation of brown eyes to blue represents neither a positive nor a
> negative mutation. It isEye one of several mutations such as hair
> colour, baldness, freckles and beauty spots, which neither increases
> nor
> reduces a human’s chance of survival. As Professor Eiberg says, “it
> simply shows that nature is constantly shuffling the human genome,
> creating a genetic cocktail of human chromosomes and trying out
> different changes as it does so.”
>
> ============================================================
> FERGUS(S)ON DNA Project website:
> http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.com/~colin/Ferguson/DNA/
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============================================================
FERGUS(S)ON DNA Project website:
http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.com/~colin/Ferguson/DNA/
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