Anyway my thought was this:
Obviously those that worked with Dr. Markow on the initial study of the Havasupai had read and understood the consent form, but it is not clear to me that any of the later students who were granted access to this material had thoroughly reviewed the consent forms or listened to the interviews.

Shouldn’t anyone working with human samples be fully aware of the terms and conditions those samples were obtained under? I’m genuinely curious about best practices here, since all of my background is in plant research, I never gave a second thought to any of these ethics, I never even had to review anything like humane treatment of model organisms since it isn’t even an issue for plants.

Later, improved technology allowed another student to revisit the samples and look at variation at a much higher resolution. This sound like it was work to confirm the original assessment of population diversity, repeatably is after all, a core tenant of experimental science. The right to use of the samples for this additional research was contested by the Havasupai, the samples were destroyed, reparations to the community were made, and the student’s work was not published.

When people ask her about her intent, it is no doubt extremely frustrating, often data like this is collected and analyzed very broadly and only after this initial investigation can a researcher determine what, if any, further specific investigations can be done. For example, I spent a year working for a USDA germplasm repository and my main job was the collection and extraction of genetic samples from hundreds of stone fruit trees so that we could run basic SSR profiles. The point was to obtain SSR profiles, build a library of data, and to investigate the basic diversity of commercial varieties of prunus and arminaca species with the hope that the data could be used for commercially viable research in the future. There were no consent forms because I was taking leaves from trees, not blood from people, but the methodology seems very similar.

Informed consent is a difficult topic. Most people simply haven’t invested enough time in population genetics, statistics, and protocols for preserving research data and materials needed to be truly informed about where and how their contributions may be used. A single page form and two hour interview does seem to be rather spare information for consent on research into a population’s genetic diversity as a preliminary investigation to the suitability of the material for further study on genetic markers and disease, but given that the Havasupai approached ASU, and not the other way round, perhaps the simplified forms were a well-intentioned effort to expedite the process towards the results requested by the Havasupai and not a cagey scientist keeping all her options open.

Of course, there is no way for me to be sure of any of this since I haven’t seen the consent form, the original research, the research which initiated the investigation, or any of the grant proposals used to obtain funding for work with the samples.