Humans Drank Milk, Changed Our Genes

Nicholas Wade at the New York Times has a must-read about how evolution changed the human genome within just the last few thousand years.

Apparently, the genes of many -- but not all -- humans adjusted as they began to drink cow milk after the development of cattle-raising:

The finding is a striking example of a cultural practice — the raisingof dairy cattle — feeding back into the human genome. It also seems tobe one of the first instances of convergent human evolution to bedocumented at the genetic level. Convergent evolution refers to two ormore populations acquiring the same trait independently.

The research is in the new issue of Nature Genetics.

Read my review of Wade's new book here.