There's extensive evidence for population movement from Northern Africa into Britain during the Roman period - these results don't refute that. What they do is show how much the interpretations of individuals from the past can change as technology & methods advance

Last year, myself and a team at @nhm-london.bsky.social were able to use newly developed molecular technology and recently published genomes to re-sequence her DNA. This shows no evidence of recent African (or Mediterranean) ancestry and, genetically, she looks most similar to rural Roman-era brits

An unexpected positive of our truck breaking down in the outback was being able to make Science Week in Alice Springs.

Such a cool set of events showcasing some of the amazing science going on in the NT. Special thanks to @reddirtpalaeo.bsky.social for putting up with my molecular palaeo questions!

The history of panmixia is a 200 yr tour from Darwin to the usual PopGen suspects - Galton, Pearson, Hardy and Fisher. We argue that the assumption of random mating wasn’t just a mathematical simplification and had already become embedded in the field by the Modern Synthesis.

Much of how we study evolution and the genetic diversity in nature is through mathematical models. These simplify the complexity of the natural world by making assumptions about it.