It Takes a Genome: How a Clash Between Our Genes and Modern Life Is Making Us Sick

The Adolescent Genome Revisited

As change is a hallmark of adolescence, so adolescence is a defining characteristic of the human genome. Change is ever present in the history of our species. We see it in the genetic upheavals that must have accompanied the origins of the genus a million years ago, and of the species 150,000 years ago. We also see it in the myriad ongoing genetic turnovers that have occurred as we have populated every nook and cranny of the planet. We see change in the environments and cultures that humans have occupied in their transitions from nomad to pastoralist to city-dweller, these too occurring over timescales that range from tens of thousands to just tens of years. And we see change in the distribution of disease prevalence, ...