Wells is renowned[according to whom?] for his logistically complex sample-collecting expeditions in remote parts of the world. EurAsia98, which in 1998 took him and his team from London to the Altai Mountains on the Mongolian border, via an overland route through the Caucasus, Iran and the -stans of Central Asia, was sponsored by Land Rover. In 2005 he led a team of Genographic scientists on the first modern expedition to the Tibesti Mountains in northern Chad, and in 2006 he led a team to the Wakhan Corridor on the Tajik-Afghan border. His work has taken him to more than 100 countries.
He wrote the book The Journey of Man: A Genetic Odyssey (2002),[3] which explains how genetic data has been used to trace human migrations over the past 50,000 years, when modern humans first migrated outside of Africa. According to Wells, one group took a southern route and populated southern India and southeast Asia, then Australia. The other group, accounting for 90% of the world's non-African population (some 5.4 billion people as of 2014), took a northern route, eventually peopling most of Eurasia (largely displacing the aboriginals in southern India, Sri Lanka and Southeast Asia in the process), North Africa and the Americas. Wells also wrote and presented the 2003 PBS/National Geographic documentary of the same name. Wells has contributed to efforts to determine the date of Y-chromosomal Adam.[4]
From 2005-2015, Wells led the Genographic Project, undertaken by the National Geographic Society, IBM, and the Waitt Foundation,[5] which aimed to create a picture of how our ancestors populated the planet by analyzing DNA samples from around the world.[6] The project is credited with creating the personal genomics industry.
Wells was one of the keynote speakers at the Southern California Genealogical Society Jamboree that was co-sponsored by the International Society of Genetic Genealogy on June 3, 2013. The focus was on Family History and DNA: Genetic Genealogy in 2013, where he was quoted as saying:
Since 2005, the Genographic Project has used the latest genetic technology to expand our knowledge of the human story, and its pioneering use of DNA testing to engage and involve the public in the research effort has helped to create a new breed of "citizen scientist." Geno 2.0 expands the scope for citizen science, harnessing the power of the crowd to discover new details of human population history.[8]
Allegations of anti-Semitism
In July 2020, Wells attracted criticism[9] for tweeting that Israel should be bombed “until the sand turns to glass”.[10][11] from the online edition of Algemeiner Journal.[12]
The University of Texas at Austin subsequently distanced itself from Wells, stating, "Spencer Wells is no longer a faculty or advisory council member at UT. He previously had a courtesy, unpaid appointment as a part-time adjunct that did not involve teaching. That ended in May and was not renewed. We do not have any association with the views held by Mr. Wells."[12][13]
Personal life
Wells is married to Holly Morse,[14] and the two have lived in Lombok, Indonesia since 2020. He was previously married to Trendell Thompson (1998-2005), with whom he has two children, Sasha Thompson-Wells and Margot Thompson-Wells; and Pamela Caragol Wells (2005-2015).
