photo: kevindooley/ BY-NC-SA

New research done by Medical Research Council Scientists has unveiled a community in Papua New Guinea that has developed a genetic resistance to a fatal brain disease from their ritual practice of mortuary feasting, or the consumption of dead family members. This community of people in the Eastern Highlands of Papua New Guinea was originally affected by a pandemic of the "kuru" brain disease, but the inheritance of a new variation in a protein gene has built up a resistance to the disease among members of the community.

An article from Science Daily states,

"This gene mutation, which is found nowhere else in the world, seems to offer high or even complete protection against the development of kuru and has become frequent in this area through natural selection over recent history, in direct response to the epidemic. This is thought be perhaps the strongest example yet of recent natural selection in humans."

This new research is absolutely amazing to me, especially since I've been learning about evolution in my AP Biology class. Essentially, this population of Papua New Guinea underwent natural selection induced by their own cultural customs. Those who would consume the corpses of their dead infected with the disease would contract the disease and then die if they did not have the protein variation. Those with the variation would survive and pass on their genes to their children, effectively demonstrating Darwin's theory of evolution. 

I hear about the Grant's finches on the Galapagos all the time in my biology class so it's a breath of fresh air to learn of current human evolution caused by a cultural practice.

(via Science Daily)