Bedford County brothers make splash in science

Two brothers from Bedford County are making a splash in the scientific community for a fledgling project attempting to link the fields of biology and literature through DNA still existing in the pages of ancient manuscripts.

A little history
Before the advent of Gutenberg’s printing press in the 1400s, most manuscripts in Europe were written on animal skin parchment, known as vellum.

Even after the popularization of paper, some manuscripts, especially important documents, were transcribed on vellum for its superior longevity.

The skin of younger animals was more pliable than that of older animals, but a younger animal’s hide could not produce as much parchment as an older animal’s.

As a result, some multi-page manuscripts were written on skin from different animals, or even different types of animals.

One is an English professor who dipped into science as a tool for analyzing medieval documents.

The other, a seminary graduate, teaches biology at a community college in Keysville, and got his taste of DNA research in the field of ornithology.

Until recently, neither Timothy Stinson nor his brother, Mike Stinson, had any aspirations to work on a project that would take the scientific world by storm.

But that’s what has happened. The two men have drawn international attention over the past several weeks for their work. They have been featured in publications like National Geographic, Scientific American and Science Daily, and in publications in India, the United Kingdom and Greece.

Timothy Stinson spoke Friday at the annual meeting of the Bibliographical Society of America in New York, one of the oldest organizations dedicated to ancient manuscripts.

Timothy Stinson, 37, who teaches English at North Carolina State University, said he got the idea for the project a little more than two years ago.

“I was working on some texts, and I was going through the process of trying to figure out when and where these books are from,” he said.

Mike Stinson, 44, a professor at Southside Community College said receiving an inquisitive phone call from his brother was nothing peculiar.

“We’re always talking about something or another that’s not necessarily related to … our professions,” he said.

But this time, his brother wanted to talk about something related to both of their professions.

Timothy Stinson, who received his Ph.D. in English Language and Literature from the University of Virginia, said he knew that the parchment used for most medieval manuscripts, especially in France and England, was made from animal skin, usually that of cows.

“Suddenly I had this kind of light bulb moment where I said, ‘hey this is on animal skin,’” he said.

With that realization, he said, he wanted to be sure that DNA still existed in the pages, and if it could be used to help discern more information about particular documents.

Mike Stinson, who received a Ph.D. in environmental biology from the University of Louisville, said he gladly joined the project.“It just sounded like fun,” he said.

The Stinsons grew up in Central Virginia, both born in Amherst County. They later moved to Bedford County where their father, Charles Stinson, served as pastor of North Bedford Baptist Church.

Mike Stinson graduated from Jefferson Forest High School in 1982, while Timothy Stinson graduated from the music program at Virginia School of the Arts in 1990.

Charles Stinson said he has no problem processing the fact that his sons are working on a project with such a wide scope.

“Tim always has had to have some kind of project going, since he was a little kid,” he said, adding that both have always had inquisitive minds, and been strong in literary skills.

“I’m not at all surprised that this has happened.”

Charlotte Vincent, who taught Mike Stinson’s Biology I class at Jefferson Forest, said she was ecstatic when she heard about his research.

“He was just this person that science teachers always hoped they would get, and I was lucky enough to have him in my classroom,” Vincent said.

She said the highlight of her teaching career came when a professor at Columbia University cited Mike Stinson’s research in an article about the migration of House Finches from New York.

“It’s really exciting for me to hear of his success,” she said.

She said Charles Stinson contacted her when the brothers’ research began to draw attention.

“Apparently I did something right,” she said, adding “I thought he was going to be a great scientist.”

The goal of the project, Timothy Stinson said, is to compile a database of documents that can be used for comparison with subsequently tested documents.

Michael Stinson said comparing the DNA from separate samples can’t determine an exact date, or even year of its origin, but testing some documents of known origin and date can allow scientists to establish a relative dating method.

Using this method, scientists would test a manuscript whose date and region were known, and, based on changes in DNA, would be able to determine a more precise date and location for the unknown documents.

The process, Michael said, begins with harvesting DNA from the manuscript, which could be accomplished using multiple methods.

Currently, he said, the only method they have tested is taking a fragment of the document and mixing it with certain chemicals to harvest the DNA. But the brothers hope to be able to use less destructive methods, such as swabbing the document or scraping a small section.

He hopes to determine “what’s the least amount of damage we can do to the manuscript and still get useful information out of it.”

Timothy Stinson said he’s excited about the progress the project has made so far, and is even more excited about moving to the process of dating the manuscripts.

The project’s first two grants, he said, totaled under $10,000, and due to the expenses of each test, he said, very little has been done except to establish that usable DNA still exists in the parchment.

“So we did all of this on a shoestring,” he said. “Money goes fast in science.”

He said he wants to aim for a low six-digit number in further grants, but didn’t have a specific amount.

Michael Stinson said he hopes to end up with a grant of somewhere around $200,000.

Charles Stinson said he’s anxious to see what happens from here.

“Obviously, we’re quite proud of them,” he said. “I know they both worked hard to accomplish what they did.”