[http://www.africanancestry.com/] He also serves as an associate professor in the Section of Genetic Medicine of the Department of Medicine at the University of Chicago. Rick Kittles, PhD, received a BS in biology from the Rochester Institute of Technology in 1989 and a PhD in biological sciences from George Washington University in 1998. degree in biology from the Rochester Institute of Technology (1989), where he pledged Kappa Alpha Psi fraternity, and a Ph.D. in biology from George Washington University in Washington, D.C. (1998). Sometimes Ricky goes by various nicknames including Ricky A Kittles, Ricahrd Kittles, Richard Kittles, Richard A Kittles and Anthony Kittles. If I go to Wisconsin and look in the phone book and see a Kittles, more than likely Im going to be related to that person. Similarly, common lineagesusually more ancient ones, from which others evolved and branched outwardrecur frequently in more than one population. But failing that, he says, he is able to specify the present-day country their DNA points to (most of the continents national boundaries are postcolonial phenomena, finalized a century ago or less). The obstacles in his way were just as sizable as the potential. Ricky Kittles is 56 years old today because Ricky's birthday is on 03/16/1966. "It has nothing to do with race, it has more to do with ancestry," explained Rick Kittles, the director of the Center for Population Genetics at the University of Arizona and co-founder of . Its important to have a historical place of origin, he says, and Africa is a huge continentmuch larger than the U.S. For African Americans, DNAs promise is particularly seductive. to improve the cultural, emotional, physical, spiritual and economic wellbeing of people across the African Diaspora. Kittles launched African Ancestry in February 2003 with Paige, a Washington, D.C., entrepreneur who, as president, oversees the company's marketing and finances. Kittles's tests also confirmed what researchers had long suspected; around 30 percent of African Americans had European ancestors, primarily due to the rape of slave women by white slaveholders. Rick Kittles, PhD, received a BS in biology from the Rochester Institute of Technology in 1989 and a PhD in biological sciences from George Washington University in 1998. Some feared his work could be used to resanctify disgraced racial theories, or that DNAs essentializing power might engulf other aspects of African American identity. Its like your last name, he says. Al Sampsons DNA led him to Sierra Leone. African Ancestrys African DNA database remains the largest and most comprehensive ever collected, making its lineage matching the most reliable in the marketplace. But Kittles was able to merge anthropology and biology, gathering DNA samples from the remains and comparing them against a growing database of DNA obtained from modern Africans in order to find out where the eighteenth-century African Americans had originally come from. He has previously held positions at Howard University (19982004), Ohio State University (20042006), the University of Chicago (20062010), the University of Illinois Chicago (20102014), the University of Arizona (20142017), and the City of Hope National Medical Center (20172022).[1][2][3][4][5][6]. ENTREPRENEURIAL DNA: From a lineage of entrepreneurs, Paige launched her first business at age 8, with a magazine purposed to raise money for an amusement park visit. Geneticist Rick Kittles, a professor at Ohio State University, became one of the hottest young scientific researchers in the country in the early 2000s. When word of his efforts leaked out, Howard found its switchboard jammed with calls from reporters and from ordinary African Americans who wanted to know how they could sign up to be tested. Following public outcry over the federal governments haphazard excavationand some dismay that the graves had been disturbed at allthe remains were turned over to Howard researchers for more systematic examination. Beginning in 1998, as he was completing his Ph.D. at George Washington University, Kittles was hired as an assistant professor of microbiology at Howard University in Washington, D.C., and also named director of the African American Hereditary Prostate Cancer (AAHPC) Study Network at the university's National Human Genome Center. degree in biology from the Rochester Institute of Technology (1989), an M.S. Rick Antonius Kittles (born in Sylvania, Georgia, United States) is an American biologist specializing in human genetics. Be the first to contribute! More distinctive lineages are restricted to particular regions and groups. "I used to always wonder in school why everybody looks different," Kittles told Alice Thomas of the Columbus Dispatch. The two talked about science and history, and finding a sense of place. The whole countryside, he says, is basically without electricity. He is also Associate Director of Health Equities of COH Comprehensive Cancer Center. Several thousand ethnic groups exist throughout the continent, sometimes as many as 20 or 30 in a single country, and African Ancestry consults with anthropologists, archaeologists, historians, and linguists to put the data into context and account for the influences that wars or migrations or famines might have had on present-day AfricansDNA. In October he watched an episode of CBSs 60 Minutes, in which a woman wept on-camera when African Ancestry traced her lineage to Sierra Leone. [http://www.physanth.org/positions/race.html AAPA Statement on Biological Aspects of Wikipedia, Shomarka Keita Shomarka Omar Sundiata Yahye (S.O.Y.) "Rick A. Kittles," Ohio State University Medical School, http://cancergenetics.med.ohio-state.edu/2749.cfm (March 1, 2005). Nobody mentions that. The Hard Truth About the 65%. Where, he wondered, did he and his ancestors fit in? Ph.D. dissertation. Dr. Rick Kittles,former Director of the Institute of Human Genetics at the University of Illinois at Chicago, investigates the genetics of complex diseases that disproportionately impact people of color. Some people come to African Ancestry, Paige says, hoping to confirm oral histories about American Indians in the family, but the tests rarely bear them out. When Kittles tested his own DNA he's the co-founder and scientific director of African Ancestry, a genealogy and DNA testing website for people of African descent he learned he was 80 percent. In 2003, Dr. Rick Kittles and Dr. Gina Paige collaborated on a groundbreaking way to help Black people reconnect to their roots beyond the limits of their current family trees. The authors examined ancestry informative markers (AIMs) to estimate the amount of population admixture and control for this heterogeneity for stage and . Currently, he is a professor and founding director of the Division of . So those whose results dont reveal the American Indian, or Zulu, or Mende, or Mandinka lineage that oral histories led them to expect may simply have those ancestors on a still-shrouded branch of the family tree. Van Velsen | 1 Stefanie Van Velsen Feb 21, 2019. Kittles faced a public-relations problem of long standing in his new post, for the AAHPC Study Network was a government-funded project. Ghana and Ivory Coast? Rick Antonius Kittles (born in Sylvania, Georgia, United States) is an American biologist specializing in human genetics and a Senior Vice President for Research at the Morehouse School of Medicine. Dr. Kittles has published more than 240 research articles in addition to winning numerous awards and accolades. Kittles offered his customers a glimpse into their specific African ancestries, pinpointing an actual African ethnic group to which one or two of the customer's ancestors had belonged. Hes planning a trip there this year. He started with scientific literature, compiling African DNA sequences that had already been decoded and digitized. Beginning in 1998, as he was completing his Ph.D. at George Washington University, Kittles was hired as an assistant professor of microbiology at Howard University in Washington, D.C., and also named director of the African American Hereditary Prostate Cancer (AAHPC) Study Network at the university's National Human Genome Center. Its a jump-off point., Some jumps land further than others; African Ancestrys analysis transcends individual families, raising questions about the meaning of race itself. Through DNA testing, he discovered he's a descendant of the Mende people of Sierra Leone. Dr. Share to Twitter. As African-Americans, our connection and contact with our family members vary from tight nuclear families to large, well-kept branches and . PIONEERING RESEARCHER: Dr. Rick Kittles is Co-founder and Scientific Director of African Ancestry, Inc. Rick then became a researcher and funded a project for Howard University researchers, in which they exhume remains of African Americans from an 18th-century graveyard. Though usually associated with the intellectual lineage that runs from Cheikh Anta Diop (192, Cayton, Horace 19031970 Some of the research followed traditional anthropological models: caskets were examined in search of links to traditional African practices, and the scientists learned what they could from dry bones about how these enslaved African Americans had spent their working life. Beginning in 2004, he served as an associate professor in the Department of Molecular Virology, Immunology & Medical Genetics at the Tzagournis Medical Research Facility of Ohio State University in Columbus, Ohio. In fact, African Ancestry has always been a sideline; Kittless scholarly work investigates geneticsrole in diseases like prostate cancer and diabetes, which disproportionately strike African Americans. Controversy continued to dog himan anonymous letter was submitted to Ohio State's search committee, accusing him of blurring scientific and for-profit workbut it was his strong record as a prostate cancer researcher, not his work with African Ancestry, that interested his new employer. Kittles ran into trouble with the government funders who had underwritten the African Burial Ground research as he moved toward profit-making enterprises, and he parted ways with his former associate Michael Blakey in a disagreement over the new project's aims. Many consumers do not realize, the authors wrote, that the tests are probabilistic and can reach incorrect conclusions., Others criticize the expense. [1] On je afroamerikog porijekla, a poznat je 1990-ih po svom pionirskom radu u praenju porijekla Afroamerikanaca putem DNK testiranja . [1] Ia adalah keturunan Afrika-Amerika , dan terkenal pada tahun 1990-an karena karya rintisannya dalam melacak keturunan Afrika-Amerika melalui tes DNA . Geneticist Rick Kittles, a professor at Ohio State University, became one of the hottest young scientific researchers in the country in the early 2000s. UA researcher Rick Kittles is a national leader on health disparities and the role of genes and environment in disease. Study guides. Dr. Kittles is well known for his research of prostate cancer and health disparities among African . [1] He is of African-American ancestry, and achieved renown in the 1990s for his pioneering work in tracing the ancestry of African Americans via DNA testing. Many African-Americans can relate. specific ethnic groups of origin with an unrivaled level of detail, Kittles also starred opposite Josh Holloway and Sarah Wayne Callies in the action-drama series, "Colony", and was seen in Dee Rees' HBO Emmy-winning film, "Bessie", with Queen Latifah. Since that first journey to Lunsar, he has made several trips back, as do many who trace their roots to Africa, and hes added his Temne name to his business card, just above the line that reads, Ordained by Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Sampsons congregation is starting an adoption program for Lunsars orphansIm always concerned about orphanages, he says, not least because I could have grown up in oneand this year he plans to bring over a few generators to power the villages schools. In addition to the MLA, Chicago, and APA styles, your school, university, publication, or institution may have its own requirements for citations. He is also Associate Director of health equities in the Comprehensive Cancer Center. For African Americans, its hard to make that African connection, says Reverend Sampson. Be notified when an answer is posted. Loop enables you to stay up-to-date with the latest discoveries and news, connect with researchers and form new collaborations. Associate Professor, The University of Chicago, Department of Medicine Kittles received his Ph.D. in Biological Sciences from George Washington University. Rick Antonius Kittles is an American biologist specializing in human genetics and a Senior Vice President for Research at the Morehouse School of Medicine. Rick Kittles, PhD - Dec. 15, 2010 TEDxNorthwesternU: Identity, Democracy After Anatomy Alice Dreger, PhD - Dec. 15, 2010 The Biologic Basis of Obesity Jeffrey Friedman, MD, PhD - Oct. 13, 2010 From Reading to Writing Life Code Juan Enriquez, PhD - Nov. 4, 2009 Personal Genomes and Web 2.0 Volunteerism George Church, PhD - May 12, 2009 Career: Various New York and Washington, DC, area high schools, teacher, early 1990s; Howard University, Washington, DC, assistant professor and director of National Human Genome Center African American Hereditary Prostate Cancer Study Network, 1998-2004; African Burial Ground Project, New York City, researcher; African Ancestry, Inc., founding partner (with Gina Paige) and scientific director, 2002; Ohio State University, Columbus, OH, associate professor, 2004. When I started, it had fewer than 100 samples, Kittles says. Retrieved February 23, 2023 from Encyclopedia.com: https://www.encyclopedia.com/education/news-wires-white-papers-and-books/kittles-rick. The idea gained support from a group of Boston ministers who helped organize the program. Most Temne, his guide told him, live in the area around Lunsar, along the wide Rokel River 70 miles upstream from the Atlantic coast. [12] Kittles has been an advocate for studying prostate cancer among African Americans for much of his scientific career; his primary concern however, was to find out how genes and the environment increased the risk of prostate cancer. Rick Antonius Kittles (born in Sylvania, Georgia, United States) is an American biologist specializing in human genetics and a Senior Vice President for Research at the Morehouse School of Medicine. Waldo Johnson, associate professor at the School of Social Service Administration and director of the Universitys Center for the Study of Race, Politics, and Culture, disagrees. He also served as Co-Director of Molecular Genetics in the National Human Genome Center at Howard University. From approximately 1995 until 1999, as a researcher with the New York African Burial Ground Project (NYABGP), a federally funded project in New York City, in which Howard University researchers, led by anthropologist Michael Blakey, exhumed the remains of 408 African Americans from an 18th-century graveyard;[7] Kittles gathered DNA samples from the remains and compared them with samples from a DNA database to determine from where in Africa the individuals buried in the graveyard had come. Beginning in 1998, as he was completing his Ph.D. at George Washington University, Kittles was hired as an assistant professor of microbiology at Howard University in Washington, D.C., and also named director of the African American Hereditary Prostate Cancer (AAHPC) Study Network at the university's National Human Genome Center. So when Rick Kittles, a young and ambitious geneticist at Howard University, proposed using DNA testing to pinpoint the exact region or tribe of their forebears, hundreds of African Americans . The way Kittles tells it, requests from African Americans swelled to a roar. In 1990 he began his career as a teacher in several New York and Washington, D.C. area high schools. Inheritor both of wealth and of the sla, AFRICAN AMERICAN STUDIES, a field of academic and intellectual endeavorsvariously labeled Africana Studies, Afro-American Studies, Black Studies, Pa, The African diaspora is a term that refers to the dispersal of African peoples to form a distinct, transnational community. DeAnna Taylor May 28, 2019. And I felt that I was probably the right person to do it, he says, noting that for many African Americans, the idea of scientific testing raises the specter of the Tuskegee experiments, begun in 1932, in which 400 poor, black Alabama sharecroppers were denied treatment for syphilis over the course of 40 years. Call a family reunion and have everybody put in $10., Kittles takes the criticism seriously, but in stride. View Essay - BLS Concept Race.pdf from BLS 1003 at Baruch College, CUNY. Kittless analysis cant always narrow clientsgenetic past to a particular tribe. Encyclopedia.com. He has published on the prostate cancer genetics of African Americans. Scientific observers questioned whether Kittles could generate useful results in view of the fact that DNA testing could illuminate only a small sliver of a person's ancestry, and questions were raised about the size of the African DNA database on which he planned to rely. [CDATA[ On this Wikipedia the language links are at the top of the page across from the article title. Michelle, 1957-, Kittles, Rick, Lafontant-MANkarious, Jewel, 1922-1997, Lewis, . By this time it was the late 1990s; Kittles earned his PhD in 1998 and took a job as assistant professor of microbiology at Howard University. Dr. Black nationalism is the ideology of creating a nation-state for Africans living in the Maafa (a Kiswahili term used to describe t, Kitti's Hog-Nosed Bats (Craseonycteridae), https://www.encyclopedia.com/education/news-wires-white-papers-and-books/kittles-rick. He also investigated interactions between melanin and prescription drugs, and between melanin and illicit drugs such as cocaine. He also serves as an associate professor in the Department of Medicine and the Division of Epidemiology and Biostatistics at the University of Illinois, Chicago.[8]. Reporters called; ordinary people wrote to ask about being tested. All Rights Reserved Customers, who were often able to put Kittles's results together with bits of family oral history to fill in blanks in their family trees, had strong emotional responses to what they learned from African Ancestry's tests. https://www.encyclopedia.com/education/news-wires-white-papers-and-books/kittles-rick, "Kittles, Rick Get stories & special offers from Dr. Gina Paige and Guests. Kittles had a few fierce critics within the African-American community as well; charging African Americans a fee to learn about their African origins was "like charging Holocaust victims a fee to confirm their relatives were in fact gassed," University of Maryland anthropologist Fatima Jackson told the on-line magazine Salon. Compiling data gathered by other researchers, he amassed a large enough sample of African DNA to pass muster with other scientists. I told them, Five hundred years ago my DNA was removed from here by slave traders and taken to America, so Im coming back for my seat, Sampson recalls. Filmmaker Spike Lee, former United Nations ambassador Andrew Young, and actors LeVar Burton and Vanessa Williams were three of African Ancestry's celebrity clients, while over 2,000 others paid about $300 or $350 for the company's DNA tests in its first year in business. Columbus Dispatch, March 18, 2004, p. B1. Paige was honored with an Honorary Doctor of Philosophy from Global Oved Dei Seminary University. He was featured in the BBC Two films Motherland: A Genetic Journey and Motherland Moving On (released in 2003 and 2004, respectively), as well as in part 4 of the 2006 PBS series African American Lives (hosted by Henry Louis Gates). Customers could choose to have either the paternal line (though the Y chromosome, the genetic marker responsible for the development of male characteristics) or the maternal line (through mitochondrial DNA) investigated; a discount was available for the pair. Thats mainly because of the behavior of slaveholders during slavery, Kittles says. Paige travels the world helping people demystify their roots and inform on identities so that they may better understand who they are by knowing where theyre from. 2021 African Ancestry, Inc. All rights reserved. Rick Antonius Kittles (born in Sylvania, Georgia, United States) is an American biologist specializing in human genetics and a Senior Vice President for Research at the Morehouse School of Medicine. It aired in February 2006, and included research into the ancestral lineages of nine prominent African Americans: Gates, Whoopi Wikipedia. If you have the appropriate software installed, you can download article citation data to the citation manager of your choice. . Kittles is well known for his research of prostate cancer and health disparities among African Americans. He is of African American ancestry, and achieved renown in the 1990s for his pioneering work in tracing the ancestry of African Americans via DNA testing. When you look at our family history, what gets reinforced is that we were enslaved, he says. He is also known for appearing in films and TV series like Malibu's Most Wanted (2003), Get Rich or Die Tryin' (2005), Next (2007), Miracle at St. Anna (2008) among others. In 2000, Harvard University Prof. Henry Louis Gates Jr. sent his DNA to Rick Kittles, a geneticist at Howard University, to trace his ancestry.Dr. Kittles launched African Ancestry in February 2003 with Paige, a Washington, D.C., entrepreneur who, as president, oversees the companys marketing and finances. His work on tracing the genetic ancestry of African Americans has brought to focus many issues, new and old, which relate to race, ancestry, identity, and group membership. Washington, D.C.: George Washington University. But our history didnt start with slavery; we came through slavery. In part because its unearthing sparked controversy among African Americans, and because the find was archaeologically significant, the burial ground got plenty of press. To overcome that wall is more empowering than I can describe., Kittless criticsand there are manyworry that hes promising too much too fast. Yet it was outside of the academic world that Kittles made headlines. Tory Kittles Biography. However, the date of retrieval is often important. It was while doing this work that Kittles and his associates had a brainstorm. When he was hired by Ohio State in 2004, the Columbus Dispatch reported that he would bring to the university more than $1 million in research grants in addition to his teaching expertise. Another research enterprise in which Kittles became involved at the beginning of his career was the African Burial Ground Project in New York City, where Howard researchers led by anthropologist Michael Blakey exhumed the remains of 408 African Americans from an eighteenth-century graveyard. The Global African Community. For one thing, he says, his database outmeasures, by two- and threefold, any other repository of African DNA, making his results more precise than other geneticists could expect to achieve. I knew that if you started to get genetic samples from African Americans, it would be sensitive data, Kittles says. Kittles, who joined Chicagos faculty in 2006, hardly imagined any scene like Sampsons Lunsar homecoming when he began constructing the DNA database that would become the foundation of African Ancestry. Dr. Kittles is an international leader on race and genetics, health disparities, and cancer genetics. In 2003 the remains were reinterred, and this past October a monument was dedicated at the site. But youre not necessarily related to any of them; its just a common name. Other last names are more rare. He also became codirector of the molecular-genetics unit at the universitys National Human Genome Center. You hit a wall in the antebellum South. Young African Americans grow up with the debilitating idea that their history begins with slavery. Geneticist Rick Kittles, a professor at Ohio State University, became one of the hottest young scientific researchers in the country in the early 2000s. Were showing that nobodys pure. Besides the 35 percent of African Americans who discover European genes in their pastand the disparate tribes whose DNA may also be mixed inAfrican Ancestry sometimes confirms white clientsbeliefs about African forebears. He is also Associate Director of Health Equities of COH Comprehensive Cancer Center. With the industrys largest and most comprehensive database of over 30,000 indigenous African DNA samples, [10], Kittles was one of the earliest geneticists to trace the ancestry of Africans through DNA testing. When you say African American,are you talking about Kenya? He started collaborating with researchers at clinics and hospitals across Africa, who sent him genetic data volunteered by indigenous patients. Over time, the concept of race has been seen Using the companys proprietary African Lineage Database along with close collaboration with historians, anthropologists and linguists, Dr. Kittles safeguards accuracy and integrity in determining African countries of origin and Tribes. Kittles was recently named in Ebony magazine's "The Ebony Power 100.". Dr. Kittles received a Ph.D. in Biological Sciences from George Washington University in 1998. Aug 2, 2022. msm.edu . Genetics can help us have a more nuanced understanding of how we use that word, not just in the biologial sciences, but in the social sciences and humanities, he says. [14] Nowadays, Kittles and his team have been busy conducting genetic sequencing trials to try and find variations in genes that affect a person's response to drugs.[12]. Early years [ edit] Horace Cayton spent his lifetime attempting to reconcile his two halves. His work has been featured on BBC, PBS, CNN, CBS 60 Minutes, Ebony, NPR and USA TODAY, as well as hundreds of local and trade media across the world. The information provided a sense of belonging that Davidson previously lacked. They know their ancestors were from Africa, but they cant get past South Carolina or Mississippi. For Sampson, this is especially true: adopted and raised by his maternal uncle, he met his mother only three times and knew nothing about his fathers family. Journal of Black Studies 1995 26: 1, 36-61 Download Citation. In the past six years, some two dozen DNA testing companies have sprung up, offering to help people of all ethnicities re-establish long-severed links to their past. Therefore, that information is unavailable for most Encyclopedia.com content. Rick Antonius Kittles (born in Sylvania, Georgia, United States) is an American biologist specializing in human genetics. He holds a B.S. These races were not conceived as being related with each other, but Wikipedia, African American Lives is a PBS television miniseries hosted by Henry Louis Gates, Jr. focusing on African American genealogical research. Rick Antonius Kittles was born in 1976(?) For another, hes used to scrutiny. He played college football at Iowa, and was drafted by the 49ers in the fifth round of the 2017 NFL Draft. Rick Antonius Kittles (roen u Sylvaniji , Dordija , Sjedinjene Drave ) je ameriki biolog specijaliziran za ljudsku genetiku i vii potpredsjednik za istraivanje na Medicinskom fakultetu Morehouse . Terms of Use, Jo S(usenbach) Kittinger (1955-) Biography - Writings, Sidelights - Personal, Addresses, Career, Member, Work in Progress, Rick Kittles - Concocted African Ancestry, Rick Kittles - Directed Prostate Cancer Study, Rick Kittles - Callers Jammed Howard Switchboard, Rick Kittles - Attracted Celebrity Customers. Sometimes DNA companies fail to account for ethnic migrations or gene flow between populations, or the fact that a clients ancestor may have been a genetic outlier. From approximately 1997 until 1999, as a researcher with the New York African Burial Ground Project (NYABGP), a federally funded project in New York City, win which Howard University researchers, led by anthropologist Michael Blakey, exhumed the remains of 408 African Americans from an 18th-century graveyard; Kittles gathered DNA samples from the remains and compared them with samples from a DNA database to determine from where in Africa the individuals buried in the graveyard had come. Already, he had tried out his ancestry tests on a few subjects, among them his parents. Sampson booked a flight after a chance meeting with a Sierra Leone native who offered to accompany him there. in Sylvania, Georgia, in an area his family had inhabited for several generations, but he grew up in Central Islip, New York, on Long Island outside of New York City. Starting a company began to seem inevitable. Sociologist Three decades after Roots author Alex Haley followed family lore, slave-ship records, and a few snatches of inherited tribal dialect to Kunta Kinte, a Gambian warrior sold into slavery in 1767, African Americans are unearthing their ancestry in growing numbers. Rick Antonius Kittles (born in Sylvania, Georgia, United States) is an American biologist specializing in human genetics. Kittles (.. Can you list the top facts and stats about Rick Kittles? He served in these positions until 2004. Kittles was raised in Central Islip, New York. In 2003, Dr. Kittles and along with Co-founder Dr. Gina Paige pioneered a new marketplace for Black people looking to know where theyre from in Africa. Sampson met with Lunsars 40 elders, all but one of them men, and all Muslim, save one Christian. window.__mirage2 = {petok:"0Ev87EeWO4E_u.VbiRlJhxTuEeIgHupvKirG_G1EQrI-86400-0"}; But a kind of false precision is rampant right now. Cautioning consumers against any headlong plunge into genetic ancestry testing, an article in the October 19 Sciencecoauthored by 14 anthropologists, sociologists (including Duster), bioethicists, and legal scholarssummed up the skepticscase.