Dr. Ketchum States “I didn’t believe they existed."
By Ed Brown
In a recent correspondence with Dr. Melba Ketchum, I asked her what it was that had gotten her interested in the Bigfoot subject in the first place. Her response was "I wasn’t interested in the subject at all. I didn't believe they existed." She explained that her lab would receive samples because of their work on species identification. However, everything they had gotten was always a common animal. I then asked about the evidence that she and her team were able to collect during the Sasquatch Genome project, specifically from that pulled from the mtDNA (mitochondrialDNA is derived from the maternal lineage) and the nuDNA (NuclearDNA is a mix of maternal and paternal lineage) and her response was very clear and precise. She stated in her own words;“The mtDNA is 100% modern human and we were not the first to get those results. Four university labs, testing some of the same samples, had identical sequences to our results. Since species ID is done with mtDNA, this clearly establishes their humanity. The nuDNA was a mixture of human sequence and novel sequence. The novel sequence has never been seen so we do not know what it comes from, I personally wonder if it is the same as the unknown fraction of the Denisovan genome as recently published. Time will tell.”
If you are not very familiar with the term “Denisovan”, you are not alone, neither was I. I did some research and what I found was that the Denisovans were cousins to the Neanderthals. With that cleared up for me, I asked her, what’s the status of all that research and testing that she and her lab had worked so hard on? She stated that at this time, they are doing some limited work, but there was not a lot going on. When asked why, she replied that;
“There is no point in putting a lot of effort into something that will be rejected out of bias. We proved they exist, whether anyone believes it or not, and that is what we set out to do, prove or disprove.”
In my eyes, the problem was not the quality of the research; it was the response Dr. Ketchum received when trying to get her findings published. This lead us to the subject of peer reviews. I asked Dr. Ketchum pointedly, Can you explain to us the chain of events surrounding the peer reviews and the publication of the paper? And, this was her answer;
“That would take a book. Let's just say that the peer reviews from Nature were wildly biased and they can be viewed at http://bf-field-journal.blogspot.com/p/blog-page_18.html along with my appeal letter to Nature and answer to the reviewers. Apparently journals communicate because I got blocked from even getting the manuscript sent out for peer review by subsequent journals until we found a new journal willing to take it. We passed peer review with their reviewers who were selected by their expertise in genomics according to the editor. Their attorney advised them not to publish it on the day it was supposed to go live. So, we acquired the journal, renamed it and published it ourselves so we wouldn't lose the precious peer reviews. The reviews were done like any other journal. We don't know who they were, but by acquiring the journal, we acquired them also. So, as far as the peer reviews, it is not self-published. As far as the ownership of the journal, in that way it was self-published but the website and all associated content was already set up and ready to go. All we did was change the name and throw the switch to publish. Those reviews are available at the same website. It is unethical to publish peer reviews publicly so I didn't put them on that website nor did I leak them. It was someone in the project that had access. It was done without my permission or knowledge.”
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ZooBank recognizes the Sasquatch as an individual species |
I guess we would have to ask ourselves this question; If you had the discovery of a lifetime, and maybe even mankind, wouldn’t all of us do the same thing? Answer, yes, I believe we would. If the peer reviews were already done as she stated, then there was nothing unethical or deviant about her and her teams approach. Realizing that there was a lot of negative feedback for that process, I was curious if she had any plans to continue to pursue it further. She replied that, "yes, but it is a slow process without the funding."
Dr. Ketchum was a gracious guest and replied to my questions very quickly. But, I still had another big question for her, and wanted to give her an opportunity to address it. I asked Dr. Ketchum what she had to say about all the negative comments that have been floating around. I received this understandably frustrated answer;
“I feel sorry for all of those people. They don't have a life or they wouldn't be wasting their time targeting me personally. They haven't targeted the science because the science is good. They might disagree with the results but haven't disproven them. I have numerous geneticists that have supported the study, regrettably they are afraid they will be targeted with the same deluge of attacks if they come out publicly for the study so it is what it is. Worldwide, there is a deafening silence in regards to our findings.”
Through some other reports that I have read or heard about, I was of the understanding that Dr. Ketchum was doing some extensive research on the Paracas Elongated Skulls. When I asked her about this research she replied that it was too early to discuss any of their findings, and ensured me that the information on the study that had been leaked, was not a sample tested by her team. She stated that she will not release any information until her work is completed.
I found Dr. Ketchum to be a very open and honest professional. So, I had to ask this question in closing. What does the future hold for Dr. Melba Ketchum? Her response…
“That is a huge question. I just take things one day at a time these days.”
I don’t think we have heard the last of Dr. Ketchum, or at least, I hope not!
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Dr Melba Ketchum |
Artlcle by Ed Brown
Blog Post by Dan Lindholm
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