Whether that model becomes the norm or remains the exception is a question about the future of the field.

The Hair That Came Home

The object at the center of this story — a lock of hair cut from Sitting Bull’s body in December 1890, held in institutional custody for more than a century, returned to his family in 2007, and subsequently the subject of a genetic analysis that supported what the family had always known — is small enough to hold between two fingers.

Its smallness is part of its significance.