Genetic Genealogy

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Comment by Paul Caverly on August 2, 2012 at 7:14am

I just finished reading DNA USA by Bryan Sykes. I enjoyed the book but of course I am into genealogy DNA. Still lots of DNA stuff I am not familiar with and the technology is moving faster than I can keep up with. Sykes spent 3 months travelling across the USA trying to understand the American melting pot of genes. Sykes used new DNA methodology called Chromosome Painting to look at some individual DNA. This painting method was used to distinguish European, African and Asian/Native American DNA markers that may show up in individual DNA results.

One interesting item that caught my attention was a colored map of the USA showing self-declared ancestries in the highest proportions in each county taken from the 2000 census. I was surprised to see such a large group of German ancestry indicated in what appears to be at least one half of the USA. Almost all of Michigan shows German ancestry except for a couple of very small areas of Dutch, African American and Finnish ancestries. Almost every state west of Penn. in the northern half of the USA showed mainly German. You can find the map on Wikipedia http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maps_of_American_ancestries

Comment by Paul Caverly on March 7, 2012 at 4:56am

The new book, DNA & Social Networking by Debbie Kennett is worth having. Amazon.ca sells it at a discount. Since the book is new it has up to date links identified.Retail abt. $28, amazon abt. $15

Comment by Brian DeGraaf on March 5, 2010 at 1:17pm

The recent PBS TV series, Faces of America, claimed that genetic genealogy proved some of the show's celebrities/participants were genetic cousins with each other (a surprisingly high percentage of the 11 total participants) within the past 250 years or less than 10 generations. For those of us who were watching the program, this was surprising and intriguing. Mr. Seaver over at Genea-Musings.com sums it up best and he (and just about everyone who watched the show for that matter) would like more insight into their conclusions. Dr. Bettinger? Sounds like a great blog post idea ;-)

Comment by Debbie Kennett on January 15, 2010 at 5:04pm

Those of you in the UK will be interested to know that the speakers have now been announced for the DNA workshop at this year's "Who do you think you are? Live" which takes place from 26th to 28th February at Olympia in London. The full list of speakers can be seen here.

Comment by Mavis Jones on November 15, 2009 at 9:07pm

Scott, thanks for the input.

Comment by Scott Norton on November 15, 2009 at 8:36pm

Mavis,

Let me know what they turn up on your Y DNA test.

Comment by Scott Norton on November 15, 2009 at 8:35pm

Hi Mavis,

I'm not nearly as experienced with mtDNA but if it was me, I would not spring for a full panel on the cousin. If she is related it will show up at the most basic level. However, having said that, I don't know what your mtDNA looks like. If it is a very common type you will be matching a whole lot of people and there's a chance that your cousin could be a lower panel match and not related.

So, short story. I'd go for the $139 package.

Comment by Mavis Jones on November 15, 2009 at 5:38pm

Larry, thanks for the input. The "new" cousin would be my 2nd cousin once removed. Her mother would be my 2nd cousin and her grandmother and my mother - 1st cousins.

Both the 1900 and 1910 census support my great grandmother having other living children that did not live with my great grandparents. That's why I've made the assumption that the relation was through great grandmother. However, great-granddad was previously married plus was a lady's man, so it's possible that my great-aunt could have been his child.

Comment by James Larry Vick on November 15, 2009 at 12:00pm

Mavis,

If I follow you correctly, you think the new "cousin" may be a second cousin. It also sounds like you aren't positive that this cousin is related to you through the maternal line. If you think there is the possibility of a recent common ancestor in any of your lines you might consider using testing by 23andMe. 23andMe will examine your autosomal DNA in addition to your mtDNA to see if there is evidence of recent shared ancestry. The 23andMe test should be very good for detecting 2nd cousins. 23andMe says the probability of detecting a known 2nd cousin using their Relative Finder tool is greater than 99 percent.

Regards,

Larry

Comment by Mavis Jones on November 15, 2009 at 10:33am

Since Family Tree DNA is having a sale right now, I've decided to take full advantage (this will be my Christmas present). One thing I'm doing is retesting both my maternal and paternal lines. The first time I went through Ancestry. I've determined that the analysis was probably correct but the interpretation for the haplogroups is definitely suspect (have a few earlier posts about this). One question I have is I'm doing the full sequence on my mtDNA.

I'm also planning to have a "new" cousin tested, if she is willing. Per information handed down from my grandmother, my cousin's great grandmother was my grandmother's half sister. Based on information gathered so far, I think that the connection is via my great-grandmother (grandmom's mom) but I've never been able to fully connect them via paper trail and am hoping that this will possibly provide the link. My question is would I need to also do the full sequence on my cousin if I'm doing the full sequence?

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