Another Genetic Quirk of the Solomon Islands: Blond Hair

[cali]

By SINDYA N. BHANOO
Published: May 3, 2012



In the Solomon Islands, about 10 percent of the dark-skinned indigenous people have strikingly blond hair. Some islanders theorize that the coloring could be a result of excess sun exposure, or a diet rich in fish. Another explanation is that the blondness was inherited from distant ancestors — European traders and explorers who came to the islands.

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But that’s not the case, researchers now report. The gene variant responsible for blond hair in the islanders is distinctly different from the gene that causes blond hair in Europeans.

“For me it breaks down any kind of simple notions you might have about race,” said Carlos Bustamante, a geneticist at Stanford University. “Humans are beautifully diverse, and this is just the tip of the iceberg.”
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The researchers also found that the variant of TYRP1 that causes blond hair in Solomon Islanders is entirely absent in the genomes of Europeans.

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http://www.nytimes.com/2012/05/08/science/another-genetic-quirk-of-the-solomon-islands-blond-hair.html?_r=1