Accra, March 12, GNA - Contrary to widespread belief Eve was not in the Garden of Eden.

According to Professor Kwame Anyane-Yeboah, a Clinical Geneticist in the Paediatrics Department of the Columbia University, New York, the trace of genes of earlier generations of Eve have been found to have come from South Africa, where a type of Y chromosomes of Eve has been found. The Garden of Eden is reputed to have been in East Africa in Ethiopia.

Prof Anyane-Yeboah was delivering the last in the series of the Aggrey-Fraser-Guggisberg (A-F-G) Memorial Lectures, organized by the University of Ghana, Legon.

He was speaking on the theme: "Did Adam and Eve Really Live in The Garden of Eden? - The Genetic Connection".

Prof. Anyane-Yeboah is the third Ghanaian to deliver the A-F-G Lectures. The others are Prof Robert Gardiner and Prof Fred T. Sai. He explained that there were three types of traces of human genes that migrated from Africa - those from the West, East and South Africa. "Some, however, stayed behind while those who left went to South America through Asia and Australia," he said.

Prof Anyane-Yeboah said current evidence suggested that humans originated from South Africa, from where some migrated to other parts of the world and were still moving around.

He said only three of the 20 lineages of man have been found, adding that there are 10 lineages in the male system with only three from Africa.

He noted that it is much easier to find male descendants of a particular person. But it is also possible to know their mothers because of the presence of their chromosomes, which is usually carried onto the new born. "That of the father is not carried on in the body of the foetus."

Prof Anyane-Yeboah, who was speaking on the importance of DNA testing as a major source of detecting fraud, said DNA had helped in changing the fate of numerous people listed on the death row.

"Apparently, they had been charged and convicted wrongly by the law. Through the magic of DNA, about 80 people out of 16,000 have been exonerated from involvement in murders and other crimes in the United States."