Finland

A creation story related by Risten Lango, a Sami reindeer herder, tells of a white reindeer creating the world. The reindeer’s veins became rivers, its fur became forest, its stomach became the ocean, and its horns became mountains. For the Sami people of Scandinavia and Russia, reindeer is a staple. Some Sami herd reindeer; they rely on the animal extensively for food, tools, and clothing.

The Saami languages are Fenno-Ugrian languages spoken from central Sweden and Mid-Southern Norway to the tip of the Kola Peninsula in Russia by 25,000-35,000 speakers. The number of ethnic Saami is probably nearly 100,000. There are no deep linguistic boundaries within the language area between neighbouring dialects, but ten Saami languages can be distinguished, six of which have written standards (see map on page 29).

The Saemieh, hereafter referred as to as Sami, are the indigenous population of the Scandinavian Peninsula in Finland and the Kola Peninsula in Russia. Although Samis are best known for their reindeer husbandry, a large number of Samis lived in a hunter-gather economy until the 16th century. The Samis are still considered one people even after the diversification of their languages and the development of subcultures before roads and telecommunications were developed.

The revolution in the last few decades in molecular biology has given scientists an unprecedented understanding of how human bodies work, and fail to work, and fail to work, at the molecular level. The relationship between DNA, RNA, proteins, and human physical functions lies at the core of this understanding. In a simplified description of this relationship, DNA serves as the "master copy" of information about making the chemicals needed for life. Information from DNA is copied onto RNA, which in turn is usually used to build proteins.