celebrities

Oh, I suppose I should go ahead and link to that Elizabeth Taylor mutation article:

Double rows of eyelashes are usually the result of a mutation at FOXC2, a gene that influences all kinds of tissue development in embryos. FOXC2 mutations are thought to be responsible for, among other things, lymphedema-distichiasis syndrome, a hereditary disease that can cause disorders of the lymphatic system in addition to double eyelashes.

It's interesting, in its way. But I really want to pick a bone with this:

I was slightly crushed, then, to discover that, by most official accounts, Taylor's eyes were actually a deep blue that appeared purple when enhanced by lighting and makeup. (Truly violet eyes occur only in albinos.)

Blue eyes are blue because of the quality of light available for diffraction. There's no blue pigment in them, just as there is no blue pigment in the sea to make it blue. (Amusement park water is a different story...). This is why we can talk sensibly about eyes that always seem to be changing in color.

I see no reason to deny the woman her violet eyes. Heck, in my yard the violets (the sweet yard-growing kind, not the African kind) aren't even violet! Dark blue eyes with a touch of eumelanin in a shallower configuration might not match the crayon for color, but could easily be violet to anyone at Richard Burton distance.

OK, at ScienceOnline2011 I did a little bit of talking about Neandertals represented in art. So this entry in the NAD files truly pains me.

You see, Britney Spears Watcher picked up that story from last year about how digit ratios predict that Neandertals were oversexed.

Neanderthals may be lampooned as slack-jawed low-brows who could just about wield a heavy club on a good day, but in one important respect they outperformed us: in the number of sex partners.

Well, yes, it is a delicious irony for a blog devoted to Britney Spears to refer to anyone as a "slack-jawed low-brow" with too many sex partners. But that's not what had me concerned. No, it was the accompanying picture:

Dude! They didn't even give him a Ken Bump.

I mean, really -- I know that Britney Spears fans are always looking for quality family-friendly material, but this is just rude. Plus, I think it's sort of obviously one of those times like when they put Oprah's head on Ann-Margret's body.

UPDATE (2011-01-20): Gretchen says it's a Neandertal merkin.

And that, my friends, is Google gold.

Via a reader: The Daily Mail really aims for the lowest common denominator of genetics: "We've all suspected, now it's official: Ozzy Osbourne IS a Neanderthal"

He claims his ‘superhuman’ genes have kept him healthy despite a lifetime of rock ’n’ roll excess.

And now it seems science may back up Ozzy Osbourne’s theory that he has a particularly hardy family tree.
Researchers studying his DNA have found that the singer is the descendant of a Neanderthal man.

This is almost an entry in the Neandertal anti-defamation series. What holds it back is the clear involvement of some shady genetics company. Get this:

The researchers also examined the gene the body uses to break down alcohol and discovered an ‘unusual variant’ which could have helped Osbourne survive during the years when he drank up to four bottles of Cognac a day.

‘Given the swimming pools of booze I’d guzzled over the years – not to mention all the [drugs] – there’s really no plausible medical reason why I should be alive,’ he told The Sunday Times.

What a crock! I mean it's one thing to tell people their genomes have Neandertal markers. I mean, that's a crock, too, since we have no clear marker list yet. But at least it's a harmless entertainment-only kind of a crock.

Now, when you tell an alcoholic that he has an "unusual variant" that "could have helped" metabolize alcohol better -- that's an altogether deeper level of crockery.

I know, it's like the "Weekly World News", but cheez Louise, what a crock!

Carl Zimmer describes his experience as a master of ceremonies (with Robert Krulwich) at the Genomes, Envrionments, Traits conference ("A day among the genomes"). The conference, organized by George Church, got together on one stage almost everyone who has publicly made known their whole genome.

David Dobbs was in the audience and describes the show: "Genomes, cool conferences, and what the hell to tell people about behavioral genes". He also describes some of the backchannel talk that focused on the more concrete element of trying to predict things from genomes -- including behavioral variation:

As I'm quite interested in [behavior and mood], I couldn't help but notice that they didn't come up a lot in the formal discussions. But when I talked to people on the side, including some of those who had their genomes run, they usually confirmed my impression that people take a particularly keen intereste in genes related to things like mental health or behavior -- depression, bipolar, hyperactivty, aggression. "Oh God yes," one person told me. "Unless you're really worried about cancer or something, that's the first thing people look at. 'Do I have the crazy gene?'" Yet by my read, neither the industry nor the research community quite knows what to tell people to do with that information -- even as we move closer to making it cheaply available.