It's an immigration story written in microscopic terms and carried across the ocean in the tiniest of containers - human cells.

More than 150 years after Basques first emigrated to the West, two Boise State University researchers are trying to find out whether Basques in the Northwest are genetically similar to Basques in the province of Bizkaia in Spain's Basque Country, where most of the immigrants came from.

If their genetics are the same but their health is different, "this might tell us something about how to prevent disease in this population and the human population," said Greg Hampikian, a geneticist and biology professor at Boise State University, who is overseeing the project.

The answer lies in DNA (deoxyribonucleic acid), which stores genetic information.

"DNA is the building blocks of life," said biology graduate student Mike Davis. "Sequencing is readingthe blocks, like a story."

Davis, 36, of Boise has been working on the project since 2005. He collaborates with Josu Zubizarreta, 24, also of Boise, who finished his undergraduate degree in May.

HOW IT ALL BEGAN

Hampikian began the study in 2005 when he moved to Boise from Atlanta with the idea of finding a unique population to study.

The day he arrived, there was a party on the Basque Block in Downtown Boise, and he knew he had found his group.

There are about 7,500 people who identify as Basque in southern Idaho, said BSU history professor John Bieter, who has studied Basque migration.

It's hard to know exactly because of the various ways Basques have been counted over the years, he said.

"Basques have historically been shrouded in mystery. DNA gets behind that," said Bieter, who contributed his DNA to the study. "It helps to get at origin and any elements that make them unique."

It also shows the modern exchange going on between the Basque Country, an autonomous area in northern Spain, and Boise.

"That conversation, the Basque immigrants couldn't have imagined," he said. "The group that came over as the lowest of classes is now participating in an educational study."

Davis is trying to establish a comparison between the two Basque populations, which will be part of his master's thesis. He hopes to publish his findings this fall.

Davis is studying mitochondrial DNA inherited from the mother. Davis has been collecting DNA from participants whose mothers and grandmothers have Basque maiden names. So far, he has about 55 samples.

According to Hampikian, "One type is really prevalent here. Some very influential female É her whole lineage has survived," he said. "Most family lines go dead, even though we tend to think of families lasting forever."

Davis is interested in the kinds of genetic consequences that may result from migration and colonization.

"With studies like this, you can really get a handle on what happens when a population moves," he said. "How do the Basques of Idaho fit into this genetic variation of everyone in the Basque Country? It's more diverse than you might expect based on the history of Basque migration here."

Zubizarreta, who joined the project last year, is looking at the Y chromosome, which is inherited from the father. He's working in the lab while he studies for the MCAT, and also hopes to publish his study.

"One thing I was hoping to find was a unique Basque gene - this one with the little chapela on it is the Basque one," Zubizarreta said. A chapela is the black beret Basque men wear.

Turns out there isn't one.

As Davis explained, "We're looking at the frequency of different (genetic) markers, but those markers are found throughout Europe."

POLITICS AND SCIENCE

Privacy advocates in the United States have questioned the stockpiling of DNA because they say it could be used to take away the individual freedoms of a particular group of people, often convicted felons, who didn't have a choice about giving up their genetic data.

Some Basques have raised similar concerns, given the sometimes violent relationship between Basque nationalists and the Spanish government over the past century.

None of the information that goes into the database can be used to create a personal profile, such as appearance or health, Davis said. The researchers don't even collect full names of DNA donors.

Nonetheless, one potential donor at the San Ignazio festival last summer declined to give his DNA because he thought the Spanish government would have access to the information.

After researchers from the Basque Country came to Boise last summer to collect DNA for a separate study, an article in one of the right-wing papers in Spain insinuated that the data was being collected for political purposes, Zubizarreta said. It isn't, Davis said.

Zubizarreta hopes that with more collaboration with people in the Basque Country, researchers will be able to see how different lifestyles might decrease the percentage of specific ailments, such as Alzheimer's disease.

Both of his grandparents in the Basque Country died of Alzheimer's.

"That's more important to me, being Basque and having family," he said.

Bethann Stewart: 377-6393