Minister of Justice Chen Ding-nan's (
Chen was among seven people in Taiwan selected by Wells and his research team to have their DNA collected and advance his research project in tracing humanity's path.
"Based on the result of the study, it shows that Chen might also have a percentage of European lineage as his ancestors migrated out of Africa into the Central Asia area before settling down in East Asia," said Wells, head of the Population Genetics Center in Cambridge, UK, at a press conference yesterday.
Wells is also the host of the National Geographic program The Journey of Man, showing on Dec. 15.
The press conference yesterday introduced The Journey of Man exhibition, which will open today at the National Science and Technology Museum in Kaohsiung and is scheduled to run until Dec. 22. The exhibition will then move to Taipei City for a two-week run.
Wells explained how he and his team traced Chen's ancestry from his DNA samples.
All humans carry DNA that is a combination of their parents' genes, said Well, adding that the DNA comes packaged in 23 separate bundles comprised of two chromosomes.
"The Y chromosome is handed down father to son and is never altered by being combined with a woman's DNA, except in the case of mutation," explained Wells. "In other words, in the absence of a mutation, a man's Y chromosome will perfectly mirror that of his father, his grandfather and every male in his family going back for thousands of years."
It is by comparing Y chromosomes with more than hundreds of DNA samples collected from 163 different populations that Wells and his research colleagues from Cambridge and Stanford University can prove the "out of Africa" theory.
Based on the result of his study, Wells concluded that each and every person on this planet is of a connected family of man, originated in Africa.
Writer Hou Wen-yung (
According to Wells, it suggested that Hou's ancestors migrated to East Asia from Africa some 60,000 years ago along the same route as Chen's.
"The findings are amazing," said Hou, adding that he is proud to be among those selected for the research.
Although they have yet to receive their DNA results, Academia Sinica President Lee Yuan-tseh (
A group of Taiwanese-American and Tibetan-American students at Harvard University on Saturday disrupted Chinese Ambassador to the US Xie Feng’s (謝鋒) speech at the school, accusing him of being responsible for numerous human rights violations. Four students — two Taiwanese Americans and two from Tibet — held up banners inside a conference hall where Xie was delivering a speech at the opening ceremony of the Harvard Kennedy School China Conference 2024. In a video clip provided by the Coalition of Students Resisting the CCP (Chinese Communist Party), Taiwanese-American Cosette Wu (吳亭樺) and Tibetan-American Tsering Yangchen are seen holding banners that together read:
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