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Friday, September 26, 2008

Saudis Seek to Map "Arab" Genome

A medical news story from Reuters describes an effort by Saudi researchers to map the Arab genome. The main drive for the research is to help create better medicine and treatments for disease, such as diabetes, which effect a large number of Arabs.

The story has a interesting tidbit of geography buried in it. Out of the 100 Arabs being used fifty are from the Arabian Peninsula and fifty are from elsewhere. An comment how Arabian Peninsula Arabs are "pure" is more than just racism. The Arab Conquests introduced Arab/native intermixing only to a certain point. Many to the north and west adopted Arabic cultural traits so much that for all purposes the considered themselves fully and solely Arab when in fact they were mixed, at best.

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