Genome

Aisha J. Brownlee
Wednesday 12:10-1:00

Last week in Freshman Seminar, Dr. Georgia Mae Dunston gave a lecture on genome research. Even though she didn’t get a chance to go into depth of her research, her introduction was very informative of the genome and its importance to life. She began her lecture by defining a genome, which is a record book of history and legacy of human kind. What astounded me was how each person’s genome is unique. Even though we come from two people not one person is like another. Our genome is what makes us unique but the history of our ancestors are traced within each person. Dr. Dunston connected the presentation from Dr. Carr’s lecture to the genome project, just from a biological perspective. To trace the origins of life one must not only have to understand history but also biology. Due to the research on the genome, scientists have traced the origins of life back to Africa. In order for one to understand African people and how they experienced the world, requires one to obtain knowledge of the genome. In studying the genome you see people’s history, enabling researchers to understand Africans and their ways of life. We trace this history back to Egypt and discussed that that is where wisdom is founded. This knowledge the Egyptians and how they created mathematics and letters shows that Africans provide the world with the history of mankind and its influences that are present today. Dr. Dunston furthered her lecture by talking about vibrations and how each person carries within them a vibration that others can sense. She said something in her lecture that I resonated with me and it was, “Each of us is a grace note and has sound in the universe and when playing sound we are in harmony with life” (Dunston). This quote amazed me in that how each individual is influential to others. This quote further explains the importance of the genome and how it connects life.