<p class="ql-block"><b style="font-size:15px; color:rgb(21, 100, 250);"><i>It took me a few hours to write and refine the image caption and the two sentences in the opening paragraph. That’s the level of effort I put into this article. Thank you for reading.</i></b></p> <p class="ql-block"><i style="font-size:15px;">Her mother’s mother, your mother’s mother, and so on—tracing back approximately 150,000 years—was the same black woman who lived in Africa, with a head of tightly coiled hair and a body of charcoal-black skin.</i></p> <p class="ql-block">Around 180,000 years ago, in the vast African savannah, waves of golden grass rippled in the wind under a bright sun; here and there, scattered acacia trees dotted the distant horizon. Amid this endless expanse lived a remarkable man named Adam.</p> <p class="ql-block">He had deep charcoal-black skin, a strong, muscular build, and sharp eyes well-suited for spotting prey in the open savannah. His tightly coiled hair shielded his scalp from the relentless sun. Resourceful and intelligent, Adam was highly sought-after as a mate by women from nearby groups and fathered generation after generation of sons. Today, all living men trace their lineage back to Adam, as all other male lineages from his time have gradually disappeared.</p> <p class="ql-block">However, Adam’s daughters and their female descendants were less fortunate. Over time, their lineage gradually faded away. None of Adam’s female-line descendants flourished—until one of his male descendants encountered Eve.</p> <p class="ql-block">Eve, a resilient woman with dark skin, a lean, sturdy build, and sharp, intelligent eyes, belonged to a maternal lineage that had barely survived for thousands of years since Adam’s era.</p><p class="ql-block">By the time Eve reached reproductive age, Adam’s male lineage had been expanding for thousands of years. Eve most likely mated with one of them, as they represented a large group in the population. She bore daughters and granddaughters, ensuring the survival of her female lineage. Her daughters and granddaughters continued to mate with men from Adam’s lineage. These unions thrived, eventually making Adam’s Y-DNA and Eve’s mtDNA sole unbroken genetic lineages of all living humans.</p><p class="ql-block">Adam’s male descendants also had offspring with women from other lineages, but over time, all those maternal lines disappeared. Eve’s female descendants also partnered with other male lineages, but over time, those paternal lines also vanished, leaving only descendants of Eve’s female lineage and Adam’s male lineage to continue the human story. Every human alive today descends from both Adam and Eve—without exception.</p><p class="ql-block">Around 60,000 to 70,000 years ago, humans who descended from unions of Adam’s male line and Eve’s female line—along with a minority of other ancestral branches—began migrating out of Africa. They spread into Asia and Europe, creating a lineage that outlasted all others. Over time, all other ancestral branches, including early native Asian and European populations, vanished, leaving only descendants of Eve’s female lineage and Adam’s male lineage to continue the human story.</p><p class="ql-block">Today, every single human shares the same ancestral mother, Eve, and the same ancestral father, Adam.</p><p class="ql-block">Extensive DNA evidence confirms that all humans share the same maternal ancestor. Every woman analyzed so far carries a variant of Eve’s mtDNA, passed exclusively from mother to daughter. Likewise, every man analyzed carries a variant of Adam’s Y-chromosome, passed directly from father to son.</p><p class="ql-block">However, this does not mean other ancestral lineages vanished entirely; traces of their DNA persist in our genomes today. When a woman carrying Eve’s mtDNA had children with a man from a non-Adam lineage, her male line eventually disappeared. However, her female lineage preserved the DNA of that non-Adam male and passed it down to their sons and daughters, ultimately reaching some of us today. Similarly, when a male descendant of Adam mated with a non-Eve female descendant, although his female line eventually disappeared, his male descendants retained that non-Eve DNA, which may have been passed down to some of us.</p><p class="ql-block">While we all descend from both Adam and Eve through unbroken paternal (Y-DNA) and maternal (mtDNA) lineages, different populations have inherited distinct nuclear DNA from other ancient ancestors. Although other ancient lineages eventually disappeared, fragments of their DNA persist in our bodies—as descendants of both Adam and Eve lineages—through genetic mixing.</p> <p class="ql-block"><b>Notes</b>:</p><ol><li>Adam and Eve are names borrowed from the Bible, but they are not the same individuals as those described in the Bible. Adam lived about 180,000 years ago, and Eve lived about 150,000 years ago—long before the biblical Adam, traditionally dated to around 4,000–6,000 years ago.</li><li>Less than 40 years ago, scientists made a groundbreaking discovery: all humans share the same common maternal ancestor (see reference [1]). However, it took years before scientists could sequence the much more complex Y-chromosome DNA, which is shared by all human males today, and determine that all males also descend from a single male, often referred to as 'Y-chromosomal Adam' (see reference [2]).</li></ol><p class="ql-block"><br></p><p class="ql-block"><b>References</b>:</p><p class="ql-block">[1] Cann, R.L., Stoneking, M., & Wilson, A.C. (1987). Mitochondrial DNA and human evolution. <b><i>Nature</i></b>, 325(6099), 31–36.</p><p class="ql-block">PDF download: https://media.ellinikahoaxes.gr/uploads/2017/05/Mitochondrial-DNA-and-human-evolution.pdf</p><p class="ql-block"><br></p><p class="ql-block">[2] Poznik, G.D., Henn, B.M., Yee, M.C., et al. (2013). Sequencing Y chromosomes resolves discrepancy in time to common ancestor of males versus females. <b><i>Science</i></b>, 341(6145), 562–565.</p><p class="ql-block">PDF download: https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC4032117/pdf/nihms-583922.pdf</p>