In
human genetics, the
Mitochondrial Eve (also
mt-Eve, mt-MRCA) is the
matrilineal most recent common ancestor (MRCA) of all
currently living humans, i.e., the most recent woman from whom all living humans descend in an unbroken line purely through their mothers, and through the mothers of those mothers, back until all lines converge on one woman. Mitochondrial Eve lived later than
Homo heidelbergensis and the emergence of
Homo neanderthalensis, but earlier than the
out of Africa migration,
[2] but her age is not known with certainty; a 2009 estimate cites an age between c. 152 and 234 thousand years ago (95% CI);
[3] a 2013 study cites a range of 99–148 thousand years ago.
[4]
Because
mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) is almost exclusively passed from mother to offspring without
recombination (see the exception at
paternal mtDNA transmission), most mtDNA in every living person differs only by the
mutations that have occurred over generations in the
germ cell mtDNA since the
conception of the original "Mitochondrial Eve".
The male analog to the Mitochondrial Eve is the
Y-chromosomal Adam, the member of
Homo sapiens sapiens from whom all living humans are
patrilineally descended. Rather than mtDNA, the inherited DNA in the male case is the nuclear
Y chromosome. Mitochondrial Eve and Y-chromosomal Adam need not have lived at the same time.
[5]
As of 2013, estimates for mt-MRCA and Y-MRCA alike are still subject to substantial uncertainty; thus, Y-MRCA has been estimated to have lived during a wide range of times from 180,000 to 581,000 years ago
[6][7][8] (with a most likely age of between 120,000 and 156,000 years ago, roughly consistent with the estimate for mt-MRCA
[4][9]).
