Solomon Island is located in the continent of Oceania, It covers 27,986 square kilometres of land and 910 square kilometres of water, making it the 145th largest nation in the world with a total area of 28,896 square kilometres.
In the Solomon Islands, about 10 percent of the dark-skinned indigenous people have strikingly blond hair. Some islanders theorize that the colouring could be a result of excess sun exposure, or a diet rich in fish. Another explanation is that the blondness was inherited from distant ancestors — European traders and explorers who came to the islands.
But that’s not the case, researchers now report. The gene variant responsible for blond hair in the islanders is distinctly different from the gene that causes blond hair in Europeans.
“For me, it breaks down any kind of simple notions you might have about race,” said Carlos Bustamante, a geneticist at Stanford University. “Humans are beautifully diverse, and this is just the tip of the iceberg.”
Dr. Bustamante and his colleagues published their findings in the current issue of the journal Science.
