Alaska Natives are submitting DNA samples to see if they are related to a 10,300-year-old man.

Sealaska Heritage Institute, a nonprofit owned by Sealaska Corporation, is promoting the research. Rosita Worl, the president of the institute, said Tlingit, Haida and Tsimshian descendants are receptive to the idea.

"When this 10,300-year-old person was found on Prince of Wales, the way it was interpreted was that we had one of our ancestors offering himself to give us knowledge," Worl told The Anchorage Daily News. "They were also saying that if our culture is going to survive and flourish, then we have to be receptive to science."

Anthropologist Brian Kemp doesn't think he'll find a direct match between On Your Knees Cave man and the Alaska Natives. His prior work found a link between the man and DNA samples from tribes along the West Coast and in Argentina.

Get the Story:
Saliva samples could reveal ancient Alaskan's descendants (The Anchorage Daily News 6/6)
pwlat