[…]Genetics experts don’t believe in miracles, but they didn’t have any simple answers to the mystery of baby Nmachi. Instead, they offered three theories:
She’s the result of a gene mutation unique to her. If that is the case, Nmachi would pass the gene to her children — and they, too, would likely be white.
She’s the product of long-dormant white genes, passed on to her by her parents, that might have been carried by their predecessors for generations without surfacing until now.
While doctors have said Nmachi is not an outright albino, or lacking in all pigment, they added that the child may have some kind of mutated version of the genetic condition — and that her skin could darken over time.
Genetics and skin color is discussed here a lot. Could the geneticists here comment on this? It is being played as a sensational story, naturally.
The three “white” children are albino, which is a different mutation–if that’s what OP is at all–with I presume different, and more well known statistical pattern.
Also strangely I always get a warm fuzzy feeling when I see parents with a child of very different skin tone or ethnic origin. Not sure why. Probably the softy liberal in me thinking that if we all accepted skin colour as every bit as variable (and incidental) as hair and eye colour then the world would be a slightly more tolerant place.
(the above is officially a Sunday night “two-glass of wine” rosy-world-view observation)
The twins’ father is white, though, so it’s not really the same thing at all. The mother also could be of mixed heritage (not sure). In the case in the OP, the parents are both Nigerian, not of known mixed parentage.
Did you look at the pix? That baby looks very unlike the product of one black and one other-than-black parent.
Occam’s Razor suggests to me the hospital handed them the wrong newborn. Although you’d then expect another equally surprised couple of the opposite coloring to make the news.
“Two miracle wrong-color babies in the same day!! In one hospital!! What are the odds??!!”. Now that’d sell papers.
It’s important to distinguish between merely having white skin, and being “white” in the sense of appearing Caucasian in other traits. The Brazilian children are pretty clearly albinos. If both parents have this recessive trait, it would be expected that 1/4 of their children would be albino. Half the children being albino would be higher than expected but not way out of line.
There are a number of mutations than can lead to albinism, and not all of them produce pure white hair. In fact, hair color can range to blond or light brown. Likewise in extreme forms eye color is pink but is most often blue.
Albinos occur regularly in African populations; Malian singer Salif Keita is albino. Like other recessive mutations, the gene may be widespread in the population but will only appear when a child inherits a copy from each parent, which is likely what happened in the case in the OP. The skin, eye, and hair color are all due to a single mutated gene.
The facial features of the infant in the OP do not appear Caucasian, but seem to me to be consistent with sub-Saharan African ancestry. The odd thing is that her hair is wavy rather than kinky. I am not aware of a correlation between albinism and hair color, so this is difficult to explain.
My oldest brother is sufficiently light-skinned that he could easily pass for white; in fact, given his reluctance to ever come home for holidays and to have any of his relatives meet any of his friends in the city where he lives, I would not be surprised if he actually IS passing.
Occam’s Razor shouldn’t ignore the evidence in the photograph. The baby does not at all appear to be biracial. In fact, the mode of inheritance of skin color would suggest it is extremely unlikely.
There are multiple genes that affect skin color, and I believe each may have several alleles. However, AFAIK most of them are not straight dominant-recessive but rather codominant, in which they produce a phenotype intermediate between that produced by each allele alone.
Given that the parents appear to have little admixture of European genes, it is far more likely that the baby’s skin color is the result of a recessive mutation present in both parents, instead of a pairing between a pure or nearly pure sub-Saharan African and a Caucasian.
This said, when parents are of mixed heritage, such as in many African Americans, the chance combination of alleles of different genes could produce a child that is much lighter than either parent rather than intermediate.
I agree with Colibri on the fidelity issue. If the mom was African-American, maybe. But she is from Nigeria. Now, it’s possible the mother has some hidden European ancestors, but that’s not likely to the extent that many African-Americans do (50% admixture is not uncommon, even without having one parent be considered white).
But… I wouldn’t put too much stock in the facial features of a newborn. Although I’m not an expert, they all tend to look very similar to me.
I don’t know how I’d provide a cite for this, but lots of African American babies start out with straight or wavy hair. It curls as they age. The same might be true in African babies.
The life of Sandra Laing should be read as it is relevant to this thread. She was born to white parents, but exhibited all the coloration,and hair of long forgotten black ancestors. Legally she was white, physically she was African during the period of apartheid. Eventually, her family rejected her and she suffered for many years until after apartheid ended she was able to regularize her legal status. There was a movie, but I only remember the story from a show on PBS.
OTOH, the child may just not have her color yet. Black children are sometimes born pink/white and get much darker later on. My nephew was born this way but is now as dark as I am.
This is true. Her hair may get curlier as she gets older. It could also be Tuareg/Berber ancestry in both parents.
Her skin and hair appear somewhat darker, but not much. Her facial features appear to me to be consistent with African ancestry (although not markedly so).
Her hair is still not kinky. Interestingly, a number of the albinos in Belowjob2.0’s link also have straight hair, although it could have been straightened.
