Mitochondrial DNA and Human Evolution

              The evolution of man has always been a matter of great interest & a widely debated topic in recent times. DNA is present in each cell of the human body. The DNA of  mitochondria in the cell, can be used to reconstruct the evolutionary history of the human species.

              The origin of humans has always been a subject of great interest. Perhaps you might be the descendant of a relatives line, surviving in Africa & the other maintaining the lineage in deep pockets of Europe. Perhaps, the mitochondrial DNA may establish a clear link between a definite descendant & the parent group. Scientists analyze morphological & anatomical evidences that support the theory of evolution of life. Human DNA from diverse cultures is being compared to trace the origins of a specific lineage. There is every possibility that people living in Asia may share their ancestral origins with Americans. The reasons for choosing mitochondrial DNA as the means to study human evolutionary principles are listed below.
It avoids recombination, although, research suggests that it can merge with the nuclear DNA. The mixing of already mixed sections from the father & the brother creates a garbled genetic history.

               There's several thousand copies of mitochondrial DNA as compared to only versions of the nuclear.
Mitochondrial DNA is inherited maternally. Therefore, the tracking of the genetic line becomes simple. The traits are passed on from a great grandmother to the grandmother to her daughter & so on.
Its rate of mutation is much faster than nuclear DNA.
                 Mitochondrial DNA remains fossilized due to the sheer giant numbers.
There's conditions that select what amount or type of mitochondria enters the egg in the work of fertilization. In all the cases, homoplasmic or single type of mitochondrial DNA enters the egg indicating a slow technique of female gamete development. One time the fertilization technique gets over, the coding region of mitochondrial DNA mutates at the rate of about 0.017x10-6/site/year. The hypervariable region is the with no coding where the rate of mutation is 0.47x10-6. The rate of mutation of the whole genome is thought about to select the ancestry, while the descendants analysis reveals the changes in the mitochondrial genome. This technique of determining the evolution through mutation of mitochondrial DNA is called the 'phylogenetic technique.'