As It Enters the Sporting Spotlight, Brazil Calls on the World to Rethink Race
By Siân Herbert,
Guardian UK
| 08. 14. 2012
Brazil is now officially on track for the 2014 World Cup and 2016 Olympics. In a bid to open the world's eyes to the real Brazil – past the flat-Earth vision of carnivals and caipirinhas – the government has put its weight behind a campaign set to shake up global debates on race.
The campaign, "
We R no race" ("Nós não temos raça"), offers free DNA testing to the public to prove there is only one race – the human race. Genome mapping reveals that human beings are actually 99.5% genetically identical; and that the majority of human genetic diversity exists
within local populations, much less existing
between local populations. In short, there is no
genetic basis for race.
The project, led by
Brazilian geneticist professor Sérgio Pena, hopes to DNA test all footballers taking part in the 2014 World Cup, and potentially all Olympians in 2016. The Brazilian embassy in London is currently piloting the scheme, offering free DNA tests to the public. Brazil's minister of sport – Aldo Rebeldo –
was first in line...
Related Articles
By Charles Schmidt, Undark | 09.25.2026
In 2010, scientists at the University of Tokyo and other institutions reported a startling achievement: They had successfully grown a pancreas made almost entirely of rat cells within the bodies of mice. The research was directed by Hiromitsu Nakauchi, a...
By Rob Stein, NPR [cites CGS' Katie Hasson] | 09.29.2026
Cathy Tie slips on a white lab coat bearing her name and the logo of her startup: Origin Genomics. "Welcome!" she says as she leads an NPR reporter, photographer and videographer on an exclusive tour of Origin's labs located...
By Erik Adams, Sundance | 09.08.2026
The scariest movie playing at the 2026 Sundance Film Festival isn’t about cursed audio recordings or a killer demon disguised as your true love; rather it’s a 110-minute essay film about how a handful of guys obsessed with numbers and...
By Katie Bo Lillis and Zachary Cohen, CNN | 09.18.2026
The intelligence report, circulated across the US military this spring in the midst of the war with Iran, immediately set off alarm bells: A Chinese ship in the Middle East was transporting components of a nuclear weapons program.
The US...