Mitochondrial Eve

We hear lots about "Mitochondrial Eve" but what does that term exactly refer to? Is Mitochondrial Eve an actual woman? I found this blog assignment to be possibly the most intriguing I have researched all semester! Mitochondrial Eve refers to matrilineal "MRCA" (most recent common ancestor) in the study of human genetics. Basically, this "Eve" was the woman from whom all living humans descended from their mother's side, through the mother's of mother's and so on. Mitochondrial Eve is the female counterpart of Y-chromosonal Adam, the patrilinial MRCA- even though the two lived thousands of years apart. Each ancestor of people now living in the line back to the matrilineal MRCA had sisters, female cousins, etc. and some of these females may have descendants living now. But none of the female contemporaries of the "Mitochondrial Eve" has descendants living now in an unbroken female line. Mitochondrial Eve is thought to have lived around 200,000 years ago in East Africa. 

There are a few misconceptions that are widely believed about Eve that include:

• That Eve was a contemporary of Adam: Not true! It is thought that Eve lived BEFORE Adam.. perhaps 50,000-80,000 years earlier. 
• She was the only woman: One of the misconceptions of mitochondrial Eve is that since all women alive today descended in a unbroken female line from her that she was the only woman alive at the time. There may have been many other women alive at Eve's time with descendants alive today, but sometime in the past, those lines of descent included at least one male, who do not pass on their mother's mitochondrial DNA, thereby breaking the line of descent.
• She is the MCRA shared by all humans: Mitochondrial Eve is the most recent common matrilineal ancestor, not the most recent common ancestor.