Talk:Freckle

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Do freckles dissapear??

- yes they will disappear if you avoid the sun or it may disapear with age

why though?

This is just a guess but maybe because if you have less exposure to the sun, the melanin draws away from the skin. I have more freckles in the summer than the winter so its just the exposure that causes my skin to make more melanin I bet. :D--66.30.84.242 03:47, 12 October 2006 (UTC)

Why are freckles more common among children than adults?

I was always pretty sparsely freckled, but I started to lose some when I was pretty young. They were almost all gone about when I turned 12, though some still show up after long-ish periods in the sun.

I've never had any freckles until I recently went to Mexico for a week. When I returned I began to notice light brown spots appearing on my right hand, and only on my right hand. They went from barely visable to a dark brown, and now they go up the fingers of that hand too. I thought they might be freckles, but why did they only seem to target that hand, and why do they still seem to be increasing in number, size, & shade of brown?! If anyone could offer me some insight, I'm starting to get concerned. SmokinJoeC420

From your description, those sound like "sunspots" typical on people with years of sun exposure. They represent minor skin damage and are common among middle-aged adults or younger people who have had intense exposure. They seem to appear in specific clusters (like on your hand) rather than all over; I'm not sure why that is. Funnyhat 19:03, 10 August 2005 (UTC)

1 mt DNA shows no Neanderthal connection
2 Freckle Puzzler
3 your site
4 ppl w/ freckles
5 Getting rid of them
6 "...Night without stars"
7 melanin

[edit] mt DNA shows no Neanderthal connection

I cut this paragraph and reference from the article:

Based on recent genetic research, it has been suggested that this gene had Neanderthalic origins. (The basis of the claim is the age of the gene; this is not in itself proof, since Homo erectus pre-existed the Neanderthals.)

Subjective news-article mentioning redhair/freckles genetic link with Neanderthals

I cut the paragraph because genetic comparisons of human and Neanderthal mitchondrial DNA show no evidence of genetic flow between H. sapiens and H. neanderthalensis (Serre et al. No evidence of Neandertal mtDNA contribution to early modern humans. PLoS Biology 2:313–7 (2004)). So the claim about freckles is wrong. Gdr 10:52, 2004 Oct 14 (UTC)

From what i've read on the mtDNA results, the claim no gene flow at all is premature. For one thing, mtDNA would (except in (very?) rare cases) show no gene flow to you from your father. For another, the commonly cited "24 mutations between Neanderthal-modern, compared to max 22 intra-modern" isn't the whole story; the minimum Neanderthal-modern is reported to be actually 13.

I'm not saying there was gene flow, but I don't see how these mtDNA results are anywhere near a proof of absence. If someone can find a non-dead link to a reference, particularly with more details on the genetic dating (e.g. if the studies indicate that the freckle gene entered the H. sapiens gene pool 50,000 years ago, that speaks well for it not being from an ancestor further back). --Anomie 23:13, 11 July 2005 (UTC)

Could you be more specific on this infamous 'Celtic Gene'? I have never heard of it before, I have however seen freckles in people from Asian, Latin American and African descent. Did this celtic gene spread everywhere then?

I thought this was an excellent point, but not something that belongs in the article, so I'm going to remove it and leave it on talk. fuddlemark (fuddle me!) 13:52, 29 November 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Freckle Puzzler

I was wondering if and why a freckle can appear overnight. In particular one was just formed on my neck and it's the middle of winter! How can this be? In the summer I'm a lifeguard and I'm in the sun all the time but I have hardly ANY other freckles. Also, I hate them. Why/how did I get this one NOW?

- Happened to me once too, right in the middle of my hand. There was no freckle there, and then bam, there was a freckle. Funny thing is though, one day, about a month later, it was gone. This happened to me again, and a few weeks later I was scratching at it, and it came off. Kinda scary, I know, but wait and see what the future holds.

[edit] your site

I think that this site does not give an availible search site to find other articles and definitions...and i think that you should fix that so that the site is more functional!

[edit] ppl w/ freckles

People with freckles are really ugly.. no just kidding i have them too and i love my freckles.

my girlfriend has a few frecles in the summer, and i luuuv em Gwissi 22:32, 14 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Getting rid of them

Is there a way to get rid of them without spending lots of $$$ on expensive treatments?

No. The only thing you can do is stay out of the sun as much as possible and they will fade.

[edit] "...Night without stars"

The previous version attributed the "...night without stars" quote to Stephen Majercik, but Googling it turned up other attributions to Eric Machmer, Anon, Irish proverb, and so forth. So I have changed the attribution to "unknown," until decisive evidence can be produced for who originated this phrase. --Groggy Dice 00:29, 7 August 2006 (UTC)